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Regular Garchomp on a sand team seems kinda pointless imo, Mega Garchomp + Sand Force + Tailwind is kinda the whole point, right?
Why not have Talonflame in the middle next to Garchomp? It let's you spam Earthquake without having to use Wide Guard every other turn (or drop the move entirely for something else like Taunt). Otherwise yeah I agree with replacing Hippowdon with lv. 1 Hippopotas and putting it in the lead to use as bait with Protect (will draw attention for Fake Outs on turn 1 so Talonflame can use Tailwind instead of Quick Guard).
Excadrill with both Tailwind and Sand Rush is pretty overkill, you could maybe get a bit more creative with the speed EVs since max seems a bit redundant (and he's pretty frail so he'd def appreciate some HP). Wide Lens is actually a viable item choice on him if you're gonna be running both Drill Run and Rock Slide, I used it in a doubles team I was trying out and it was pretty good. I'm not sure what X-scissor is hitting so I would drop it for Protect since that's always good.
Yeah, the idea is to let Garchomp wreck havoc with his 170 base ATK + Sand Force insanity earthquakes.
EDIT: And to be fair using Mega Garchomp properly was the reason I made the team to begin with, him and Ttar were the original two members, the rest was added to polish an strategy using them
Well, I did consider putting Talonflame at the center, but I wouldn't be able to target the entire enemy team with MegaChomp's Earthquake, many times being able to dent the entire enemy team or even totally wipe them out ensures victories... Then again having TTar able to attack as well would be a good thing as well. I'm gonna try putting Chomp at the side an see how it goes.
Also, none of my team members gets Wide Guard... It would be awesome if they did, though, it would block those Blizzards and Icy Winds.
LV1 Hippopotas is actually sounds great... Especially with a support moveset, given Hippodown doesn't really attack. And yeah, opening with Hippo instead of TTar is a good idea, at least Hippo can take an Earthquake so I wouldn't waste a turn protecting. Then again using Hippopotas as a bait really could work well, especially baiting fake outs.
Figured as much regarding Excadrill's speed, at first I didn't do anything about it because I did consider the possibility that Tailwind would be out since it doesn't last that long and unlike Sandstorm I only have one source. Then again, Sand Rush alone may be enough and a good chunk of the time I do have Tailwind up. So.... how about 126 HP EV and 126 SPD? X-Scissor is just... there. I dunno, I've noticed that hitting neutral with Chomp is often more than enough so I guess I could go with Protect as you say. I also considered Brick Break, not so much for the coverage but in case Reflect shows up which would be a very bad thing.
Also, I think I'll stick to Life Orb, that extra power is really needed, especially if Garchomp goes down, given none of my other attackers hit that hard.
Quick Guard is best for beating Fake Out leads, who will almost always use it turn 1 (maybe Jynx4 would opt to Blizzard Garchomp instead, but it's very predictable.) It can lead to some sketchy situations where one enemy flinches Talonflame while the other KOs it with Stone Edge or something leaving you without Tailwind for the duration of the battle. Other than that, I've noticed the AI only uses priority to pick off weakened teammates, so maybe Taunt could be better to fight Trick Room teams.
Specifically, it was to replace Gengar with a bulkier supporter that has Magic Bounce to protect the rest of the team from Taunt and Encore while walling a large portion of the Maison on its own. The fourth move, Flash, gives Klefki and Dragonite more space for Substitute with Accuracy drops.
For the fourth teammate, I picked Gliscor (Jolly nature) since Mega Kangaskhan was not available due to the Mega Slot being used. The resulting team was very passive - Sableye/Klefki/Gliscor were all stall-focused, with Dragonite as the only Pokémon with instant damage potential.
I reached somewhere between 410 and 420 wins with this team before losing. When I lost, I had accidentally reached the battle video limit in VS. Recorder without noticing and was unable to save the loss, so I'm not sure of the exact battle number. What I can remember about the loss is that Mega Sableye was CH'd to death in the first few turns without it being able to contribute; afterwards, the match-up was really bad and I didn't have many options, and it ended up in a strange situation where Gliscor was left alone and ran out of PP against fourth Pokémon Landorus1, costing me the streak.
Mega Sableye filled its purpose quite well. Calm Mind ended up being used mostly for the Special Defense boost; most battles would begin with Mega Sableye using either Calm Mind or Flash, and then alternating Flash and Recover to cripple the opposition until Sableye is KO'd or the enemies' Accuracy is at -6. If the crippling was succesful, Klefki could sweep with very high reliability thanks to the enemies' accuracy being reduced.
In most battles, Magic Bounce support wasn't really needed and I sacked Sableye as what was effectively a suicide lead crippler. When it was needed, it was quite effective - reflecting Taunt back at the AI rendered it unable to use Taunt for several turns, enabling Klefki to rotate in safely. Reflecting Encore was not as effective, since the move simply fails if used on Magic Bounce - but it was still useful. As far as Taunt/Encore threats, Sableye walled many of them on its own on top of having Magic Bounce. I had much less trouble with Taunt than on prior iterations of the team despite the team's passivity. Mold Breaker Sawk4's Taunt pierced the ability and Taunted Sableye anyway, howewer.
Ultimately, Mega Sableye was viable, but it was very vulnerable to crits on the Special side with its reliance on Calm Mind boosts for survivability. When it got CH'd early on like in the loss, the battle turned into a 3v4 without Sableye's support, which wasn't a great spot to be in.
Additionally, I don't think Gliscor was a good fit for the team. It shared an Ice weakness with Dragonite, and its Substitute usage didn't abuse the AI nearly as effectively as Klefki and Dragonite. It was also pretty redundant - Dragonite and Gliscor both filled the same role of a secondary Substitute user, and their synergies with Klefki weren't too different. Howewer, I'm not sure what could be ran in its place - Mega Kangaskhan was not available due to the Mega slot being taken.
Following that line of thought, I tried a different Magic Bounce user:
With Espeon, I could bring back Mega Kangaskhan into the 4th slot while still having crippling support. I initially used Flash, but switched to Tickle which decreases both Attack and Defense, making it a little more reliable with Espeon's low survivability - the Attack drop would cripple physical attackers, while the Defense drop would set up Dragonite and Mega Kangaskhan for a sweep if it hit special attackers, making it effective against most foes unlike a move like Charm that is useless on special attackers. For the other crippling move, Yawn puts a foe to sleep for 1-3 turns, buying free turns for the rest of the team. Wish on a frail, low-HP Pokémon like Espeon was a one-time support option to go for Dragon Dance behind Wish on Dragonite, and restore Klefki's HP in a tough spot, mostly during Hail.
On Mega Kangaskhan, I switched Double-Edge for Return to better capitalize on Tickle's Defense drops. I'm not sure if it was worth it, though.
I didn't have as much success with Espeon - I lost in the 200s to Chandelure/Gardevoir/X, where Chandelure had Infiltrator and the combination of Espeon/Mega Kangaskhan failed to KO either foe thanks to poor rotations luck, causing me to lose right away with Gardevoir countering Dragonite and Infiltrator Chandelure roasting Klefki.
Howewer, the set itself did its job - most of the time, I used either Yawn to put an enemy to sleep or Wish to set up Dragonite. Tickle was used less, but also put in good work against physical line-ups. The match-up I lost to would've possibly been even worse for Sableye - Gardevoir can OHKO it, while Infiltrator Chandelure destroys my Gliscor back-up if that were to happen. The weakness in both Sableye and Espeon was clear - while Magic Bounce, crippling support, Recover stall, and Wish were nice to have and offered more against Taunt, they opened up a Chandelure-shaped hole in the team without access to Gengar's offensive presence with Shadow Ball. The Gardevoir/Chandelure combo that dealt the killing blow is also not an uncommon one with both Pokémon being ran by Hex Maniacs.
As a result, I crawled back to Gengar for its STAB Shadow Ball. Then I realized Gengar had something more to give: Perish Song. Wish-passing from Espeon was effective - with Perish Song, Gengar could phaze out an enemy and give Dragonite a completely free turn. And if the AI had lost one of its Pokémon, Perish Song would just KO them outright with a little help from Klefki.
The resulting final version of Team Substitute is identical to the previous 610-win one, except for Sludge Bomb being replaced with Perish Song. It ended up being extremely effective - the phaze turn was more effective at setting up Dragonite safely than Wish, and the killing power made securing the win against stat boosters much more simple while reducing the team's reliance on Klefki sweeps, as it only needs to use Sub/Protect to secure KOs if Perish Song is used.
I tried out Return over Double-Edge as a leftover from the Espeon iteration for the first few dozen battles. Its damage output was underwhelming especially prior to Mega Evolution, and I quickly switched back to Double-Edge.
To elaborate on how Perish Song works in rotations: the status inflicted by the move remains on Pokémon that are rotated out, and only switching can dispel it. The AI switches out when its Perish Song counter reaches 1 if possible - this means that when the AI has 4 Pokémon left, it switching out always occurs consistently on the appropriate turn (unlike most AI moves in Rotations) and lets Dragonite use Dragon Dance (or Substitute/Roost) freely. Gengar is also afflicted with the status - the perish count only advances when the Pokémon is rotated in, so keeping it in the back is not a problem. Gengar's bulk is also nonexistent, which usually gets it killed before the timer would run out in the first place. Passing Perish Song is similar to passing Toxic, or passing Wish as commonly seen in Rotations.
On top of phazing the enemy and buying Dragonite a free turn, Perish Song also reveals the AI's full team when it switches in the fourth Pokémon - which allows planning out your win condition before committing to Outrage, and reveals surprise sets the AI might have in store to halt a sweep.
Perish Song is also extremely accurate, affecting pretty much all foes equally. It is, howewer, stopped by faster Taunts (Weavile4/Electrode4/Thundurus4/Tornadus4) and the ability Soundproof, and secondary effects such as burn or paralysis KOing or crippling Gengar. If Gengar outspeeds the foes, it can usually use Perish Song twice in a battle, buying Dragonite two free turns over the course of the battle or finishing off two foes reliably; if it's outsped, Gengar is liable to get killed after using it just once.
Speaking of the Rotations AI's behaviour, I don't think your Pokémon's type immunities and resistances deter its moves - if that were the case, Klefki shouldn't get hit with Earthquake that often, but the AI seems pretty EQ-happy anyway (which results in free turns for Gengar and Dragonite, which isn't a bad thing). Howewer, I do believe that weaknesses encourage it to use super-effective moves - when using Espeon, the AI used Bug-type moves more often than before, and Gengar/Dragonite seem to bait Psychic/Dark/Ice/Ghost/Fairy/Rock attacks to some extent.
The team's titular strategy is using Substitute on Klefki. Against most enemies, alternating Protect and Substitute until the AI makes a move that doesn't break Klefki's substitute will get Klefki boosts, with which its Substitute will become more specially bulky and Dazzling Gleam will start dealing damage. Klefki can sweep by itself a lot of the time, but after one enemy has been KO'd you can use Perish Song to end the battle faster.
Since only one KO is needed to start cleaning up with Perish Song and full sweeps are rarely called for, Klefki doesn't need to boost up to +6 - just enough for its Sub to survive the opposition's strongest special attacks it can viably survive and enough power to start getting KOs.
Klefki is not invincible, howewer. On one side, it's bound by Substitute/Protect PP - both moves have 16 PP, which will run out if the battle drags on. Klefki should start attacking before that happens - boosting to +6 will not do much for you if Klefki has 3 Substitute PP when it starts attacking. More commonly, its HP will be the limit - if Klefki is hit with moves that break its Substitute several times in a row, it will not receive free Subs to recover health behind and will eventually run out. When its HP drops below 41, Substitute can't be used and Klefki is as good as dead.
When it's too dangerous for Klefki to go alone, its teammates will step in.
Dragonite is the team's secondary Substitute abuser, one-click sweeper, and Roost+Multiscale staller. Its typing has excellent synergy with Klefki, resisting Fire and Ground while Klefki resists Ice, Rock and Fairy while being immune to Dragon.
Against a large portion of the Maison, Multiscale Dragonite can just Dragon Dance and Roost to its heart's content. This Dragonite works a little differently with Substitute, using the move for status protection and fishing for free Substitutes like Klefki does, and recovering health back with Roost to keep using it. By using Substitute, it can safely rotate into slower Pokémon like Tyrantrum4 and Glaceon4 that would OHKO it in its quest to set up Substitute.
Dragonite's biggest weakness is being completely walled by Fairy-type opponents, thanks to running only Outrage as its attacking move. Klefki beats all Fairies handily with Heat Wave from Togekiss4 as the only potential issue, though.
In addition to that, Dragonite's Speed is a problem prior to using Dragon Dance, and against particularly fast opponents, afterwards as well. For example, +0 Dragonite can rotate in on Glaceon4 and use Substitute safely while fishing and reducing its PP, but it can't do so on Froslass4 which is faster. Thankfully, there's a way to get Dragonite up to Speed against any opponent in complete safety:
Gengar, providing immediate offense with Shadow Ball, Toxic and Destiny Bond, and passing phazing support and KOs with Perish Song. If Dragonite is one Dragon Dance away from working its magic, Perish Song will get it there when the AI switches out as its Song counter reaches 1 after Klefki has stalled the turns. If it needs two, Perish Song will also get it there most of the time, barring faster opponents or secondary effects. If Gengar gets to move for free on a move it it immune to, or a move like Protect (Perish Song Song goes through Protect), or the enemies just don't deal enough damage to KO it, there'll be enough songs to blow the AI's side wide open. Most of the time, Gengar doesn't suffer from its Perish Song timer, but if it survives long enough to see it fall to 1, switching it out to sing another day is fine if there's no risk in Kangaskhan eating a hit.
Typing-wise, Gengar isn't quite as great as the Dragon / Steel/Fairy core of Dragonite/Klefki, but an immunity to Ground and Fighting, and weaknesses to Dark, Psychic and Ghost inviting resisted Dark- and Psychic-type moves into Klefki's Substitute are useful.
Klefki and Dragonite are both protected from status with Substitute and Lum Berry, but Gengar is much more suspectible. Howewer, you can play around the AI to extend that protection to Gengar (and Kangaskhan): if your current active Pokémon (i.e. the Pokémon you used a move on the previous turn) has a Substitute up, the AI will not use T-Wave, Confuse Ray, Hypnosis, etc on that turn. So if there is an enemy that has T-Wave, to bring in Gengar you should set up an intact Substitute first, rotate in Gengar, and then rotate it out instantly to possibly invite a status move into that Substitute. This also goes for Dragonite, in case there are status move users that outspeed it in order to preserve its Lum Berry. Note that this does not apply to Teeter Dance, which the AI will happily use when Substitute blocks it; and that on bad sets with no moves that the AI likes, the AI may rarely a status move anyway (these sets have Toxic or Will-O-Wisp instead of more dangerous moves such as Swagger and T-Wave).
I use Perish Song very generously, since it's highly reliable and a free turn for Dragonite nearly always pays off.
On the offensive side, Gengar's Shadow Ball is decent and Sash lets it duke it out for a while. But Gengar isn't really going to clean up four Pokémon on its own; for that, we have...
Mega Kangaskhan filling the back-up slot as a cleaner. Jolly Nature, as Sucker Punch is not reliable in Rotations and can't be relied on to get around the lower Speed of Adamant; Scrappy is essential to be able to hit Ghosts; Double-Edge maximizes its damage output; Fake Out is free damage and gets Kangaskhan up to its Mega Speed if there are no abilities that activate on Contact, or Evasion boosts in play; Earthquake provides coverage against Rock- and Steel-types; and the least used move, Sucker Punch, provides priority in crisis situations against faster weakened opponents.
Kangaskhan has no defensive utility unlike the rest of the team; it punches holes in the opposition with its outrageous Parental Bond-boosted attacks. It fears status, but using Substitute as mentioned in the prior section helps. Contact abilities are a problem - if there's a risk of Flame Body or Static, Fake Out can be too risky to be worth using. Earthquake does not make contact, and works against many Static users if the move is a viable choice.
Situational threats and measures to play around them:
Infernape4 is the most threatening Pokémon that uses Encore, which can put a stop to both Klefki and Dragonite. Against it (and other Encore users), Perish Song can create space; but the more important play is to keep Dragonite safe from Encore, and prevent Klefki from being Encored into a move that would put it in danger.
The way to do this is to alternate Substitute/Protect on Klefki, even if Klefki has an intact Substitute already. Since both moves outprioritize Encore and Protect blocks it, Klefki can only be encored into Substitute when doing this; after Klefki has been Encored, the AI will not use Encore if the current active Pokémon is already afflicted with it. This lets Dragonite rotate in freely without fearing Encore, and then rotate back to Klefki into a possible failed Encore. Rinse and repeat.
Against Encore users that are faster than Dragonite, its first move is also safe as Encore will fail if the target has not yet moved. This gets you one Encore-safe move prior to getting Encored for protection.
Taunt only lasts 3 turns unlike Encore's 4 and doesn't completely disable the enemy as attacking moves are still useful, which makes it a less dangerous condition than Encore - but on the flip side, there are a lot more sets that carry it. The counter-play of getting one Pokémon (usually Klefki) Taunted on purpose to protect Dragonite is identical to Encore.
Articuno1 carries Hail which cancels Klefki's Leftovers recovery, and STAB Blizzard which has a chance to OHKO Dragonite. After it has revealed its set, you want Perish Song; but rotating in Gengar while Hail is in effect would break its Sash and possibly get it KO'd right away. Instead, you should Sub/Protect with Klefki until Hail stops, and then rotate in Gengar to use Song while the skies are clear and the AI might use Hail again to minimize the damage - or rotate it in on the final turn of Hail (at the end of which no Hail damage is dealt), which eliminates the possibility of getting off relatively clean with only 1 turn of Hail damage with a new Hail being set up, but preserves Gengar's Focus Sash if the AI makes an ineffective move.
Waiting until field conditions like weather, screens or Safeguard expire is effective against more than just Hail. The AI will not set up conditions that already exists, so waiting for them to expire gives the AI a larger pool of ineffective moves it may choose against Gengar.
These Pokémon may have the ability Infiltrator, which makes their moves ignore Substitute. This allows them to KO Klefki through Substitute with Fire-type attacks, inflict status on it with Will-O-Wisp or Hypnosis, and generally be pests. Against these you should be very careful about rotating in Klefki and consider playing offensively with the other three team members instead to eliminate the threat if Klefki is at risk. Chandelure in particular has a nasty combination of features with an immunity to Normal, good bulk, Will-O-Wisp and STAB Heat Wave. The others aren't that dangerous on their own, but with the right teammates they can become hurtful.
Aside from Infiltrator, Sound-based moves also ignore Substitute. These include Sing (Altaria4), GrassWhistle (Leafeon1), Hyper Voice (Exploud4 and Pyroar4), and others. Sing from Altaria4 is the biggest problem of these; Hyper Voice is resisted by Klefki, but it can be dangerous if it CHs.
Opposing Perish Song is very dangerous in Rotations. If any of your Pokémon are KO'd, your monsters will start dropping like flies - and switching is far from safe. If their allies don't make switching risky, playing it slow and switching around is fine; if the allies are threatening, the decision between trying to play slow and switching around orgoing on the offense at the risk of Gengar being KO'd and becoming vulnerable to Perish Song can get difficult. Usually, they can be dealt with, but it can get very dangerous.
Destiny Bond is mostly manageable through Perish Song usage and stalling with Klefki until the offenders are out of PP. Rarely, it can cause trouble, especially with multiple Destiny Bond users; but usually, Perish Song allows either setting up Dragonite to clean safely or finishing the battle without having to attack with Klefki.
#1000 - S7ZW-WWWW-WW2S-SM5K vs. Houndoom/Rapidash/Ursaring/Drifblim
Proof BV. No longer up due to the 10-battle video limit.
#1234 - EBKG-WWWW-WW2U-DCH2 vs. Scrafty/Houndoom/Ninetales/Poliwrath
#1234 proof. Taken down as well.
#512 - XH3G-WWWW-WW3X-XGLH vs. Mismagius/Chandelure/Reuniclus/Slowking
The closest battle prior to the loss.
#1439 - A5PW-WWWW-WW3X-XGJS vs. Lapras/Ferrothorn/Barbaracle/Starmie
The loss.
Edit 16/10: #1234 update, added playing instructions and threatlist
Edit 01/11: I lost the streak at battle #1439. Added battle video. Mention Destiny Bond briefly.
After much pain in anguish in all 5 modes, I finally bagged my first trophy (doubles, all that VGC paid off) using The Dutch Plumberjack's BlazeNinja core team. (soo good)
Getting one trophy may not be that big but it made all the pain a and suffering worth it, now on to triples until I can coax my TruAnt back into the light.
14:59:51: <turska> how the hell are you surviving with wally
So I had a surprisingly pleasant experience today in the Maison... posting a streak of 145 wins in ORAS super multi (with AI).
44: JF6G-WWWW-WW2T-9KXC (ridiculously narrow escape)
100: 43PW-WWWW-WW2T-9KYX (omg 100 in super multi)
146: HMTW-WWWW-WW2T-9JTX (loss)
But first, posting a streak of 73 wins too (battle video code: WWXW-WWWW-WW2T-9JUX) while I'm at it. Let me take you back eight months, to my five-trophy post.
(disclaimer: I didn't hold back here so I may come off a bit too harsh/bitchy towards the multi AI, but I also feel everybody so far has been a bit way too mild towards it, lol)
First off, I legit don't understand how you guys can say AI multi got any better than in X. I entered it in high spirits, looking to built an actually cute team to go with Steven's mons, but really soon I ended up longing for my good old Charizard/Raikou partner because Steven completely and utterly sucked. I realise I should also be seeking blame with myself for struggling with this mode (which I am, dw, my choices for my mons certainly weren't optimal), but if I reach 50 in four out of five attempts in X and this partner supposedly is objectively a lot better than in X, I can't help but expect to get the trophy without too much difficulty and/or cookie-cutter teams. Call me a sore, spoiled, whiny bitch (you'd probably be right, especially considering how much I lucked out with that Zard/Kou partner on X); it's just that all the earlier posts on the ORAS multi AI got my hopes way up and had me except them to actually... cooperate, and I was sorely disappointed.
We all know what mons Steven uses, but I'll list them anyway for good measure:
Aerodactyl is, put bluntly, the most revulting trash I've ever had the displeasure of using on a maison team. It can't deal any damage at all, which results in it making some laughably terrible decisions (using Thunder Fang on something like Bronzong while the other opponent was Braviary) and even if it did pick the right move, it hardly inflicted more than like 30% on a non-super effective hit. Metagross was a bit better because he does have the power he needs, but that EV spread is terrible (I mean really) and his move choices were occasionally quite questionable as well (trying to Hammer Arm your way through Forretress while the other opponent is Leafeon and my mon out is Gastrodon... yeah...), not to mention the undesirable accuracy of his moves and his occasional tendency to finish off faster foes with any move other than Bullet Punch. I had been talking with turskain on IRC a bit about Steven, and he said he'd prefer his Scarfmory/Golem partner any day. Go figure. Add on to that the really idiotic thing that your lead is only decided when you embark on your streak, and I hope my annoyance is a bit justified.
Anyway, because all the other teams had the usual red flags (really terrible accuracy, erratic support moves, etc etc) I was stuck with Steven. Initially I tried using Hyper Voice MegaGarde (a mon that I'm abusing the hell out of this iteration of the maison because I've got access to tutor moves now) and Mat Block Greninja as a backup (lack of inspiration), but since a backup Mat Block proved to be really underwhelming and MGarde seemed to appreciate a switch-in to Poison- and Steel-types as well as a Trick Room check and because absorbing Water-type moves looked cool for Aero, I swapped out Greninja for Gastrodon. While both Garde and Gastro did what I wanted them to do, this still didn't remotely work out like I hoped, mostly because Steven was being an idiot but also because Gastrodon required support in the removal of Grass-types (I tried Rindo Berry for a bit, but they OHKOed right through it), and if you're counting on an AI partner to support you, you're doing it wrong. So instead, I turned to an approach that others had tried before me.
Gardevoir @ Gardevoirite
Ability: Trace -> Pixilate
Nature: Timid
IVs: 31/X/31/30/30/31
EVs: 4 HP / 4 Def / 248 SpA / 252 Spe
-Faerie Scream of Death
-Psyshock
-Hidden Power Ground
-Protect
So, yeah. I wasn't too keen on leaving Garde out just yet (especially because of his matchup against Morgan's team, lol), but this time, I used Mat Block Greninja as a lead. As long as Steven sends out Metagross first, that's as good as it's gonna get. Greninja can protect Metagross for one turn to let him do his thing, and /if/ Metagross hits something it usually ends up dead, and from there you're often good to go. While I'm generally not a fan of Mat Block in doubles if it doesn't involve some sort of setup (such as Mega Blaziken's Speed Boost, Mega Lucario's Nasty Plot, or the snowball effect that Aron sets in motion) because that 1-0 lead you can take can easily be turned around into 1-2 or 2-3, this works better in multi because you can isolate one trainer here. And while the free turn from Mat Block sort of patched up Metagross's flaws (slowness+tendency to lose a turn from missing), isolating a trainer sort of patched up the problem of Aero's unreliability because he was able to make up his mind against a single foe. I got the trophy on my first run with this setup, heh.
What the ORAS approach to the AI partners did right was establish a level playing field and provide everybody with a partner that can reasonably be expected to help you get the trophy, as well as provide better default partners. However, 'better' than the X ones is all that those default partners are, and there are a bunch of other partners out there for X that are just as good or better than the ORAS defaults (I'd rate Steven on par with my Hawlucha/Slaking partner, and way inferior to my Charizard/Raikou partner - honestly, a Choice item goes a very long way in reliability), while there weren't any better partners out there for ORAS (how could there be?). Some of the X partners were simply hopeless, whereas a bunch of others could beat the chatelaine, as long as you managed to solve the puzzle of fulfilling the conditions (i.e. choosing partners) under which they could do so (in Steven's case, Mat Block Greninja/lead Metagross). ORAS did provide us with one such partner, for which some have already solved that puzzle for us to copy/get inspiration from (which wasn't doable in X because everybody had way different partners and the defaults were hopeless), but kind of left us with that sole partner. What I'm getting at is that AI multi in ORAS is 'better' in the sense that you don't have to go around begging for FCs in order to find a partner that gives you more than a snowball's chance in hell to beat the format. On the other hand, the 'Intelligence' is just as terrible, while the partners qualitatively certainly aren't better than the ones potentially available in XY. (To those guys with the 180+ streaks, you're damn prodigies, lol. You cracked the Steven puzzle, and yeah then you can go on until hax or misplays screw you over ^^ but I think this would also have been possible in XY multi, but that's just harder because collective theorymon to crack a single partner isn't possible for obvious reasons) AI multi in XY is way better in the sense that it allowed a great deal of creativity, which was stifled in ORAS by there simply being only one viable partner. I've heard there are some odd souls out there who actually enjoyed AI multi in XY in a weird adventurous sort of way, but ORAS offers them nothing at all. That's quite a shame, because for everybody else this was a 'let's get this over with and never look back' sort of format on both games anyway.
...wow, I sound angry, lol, bit embarrassing really now that I'm looking at it again :T
In a tl;dr of that section that leaves out (most of) the bitching: I won the ORAS multi trophy with Steven (like everyone), using Mat Block Greninja and Mega Gardevoir—but it took me considerably more trouble than I was led to believe by everyone chanting songs of praise about how much better the ORAS AI partners were than the XY partners. I genuinely thought, and think, that my Scarf Charizard / Raikou partner from X is better, or at the very least more reliable, than a strong mon with a bizarre EV spread and only inaccurate moves that needs a free turn to reach remotely acceptable Speed and a Pokemon that's so incredibly weak that it doesn't even remember its type chart. I entered multi in high spirits but left it annoyed and didn't want to have much more to do with the format—so essentially the way most people came out of their XY multi endeavours, heh.
However, because "unfinished business", I continued that run not even that long after and lost it at 73 in a battle that was over in the blink of an eye and pretty much exemplified why multi is annoying as heck—versus a Roller Skater and a Veteran, with a lead Drifblim and Latios. I have Greninja attack Drifblim to get damage in because using Mat Block in front of a potential Hypnosis is dumb I guess (been a long while since that battle lol sorry), Latios2 knocks Greninja down to its Sash, Metagross nearly OHKOes Latios with Meteor Mash, and Drifblim uses Destiny Bond. The next turn, Metagross uses Bullet Punch to steal the KO on Drifblim from Greninja, KOing itself in the process while Greninja KOes Latios. The backups are Braviary and Virizion. With Greninja's Sash broken, Braviary3 is a checkmate at this point. It is Braviary3.
The general unimpressiveness of this streak and my annoyance with AI stupidity and ridiculous matchup reliance (as evidenced from this battle T__T) made me uninterested in posting att; I was also busy doing other things like getting a couple 1000+ streaks in other formats, losing both of them in like three days, and just having this huge form crisis in the time after, so multis got put on the backburner for a while. However, I still wanted to get a more decent ORAS AI multi streak, and quite some time later, some IRC discussion with turskain led me to believe that Greninja / Gardevoir / Steven had potential for more than 73 consecutive wins. A new run ended somewhere in like the 30s, and I once again lost interest because I was slowly working on other, bigger, fish to fry. A little while ago, though, while I was going through my backlog of bred-but-not-yet-levelled-up Pokemon that I miiiight use in the Maison at some point if inspiration were to strike, I noticed that EV-trained lv.12 Jolly Kangaskhan that was meant for doubles if I ever thought up a use for it.
I had never used Kangaskhan in a non-singles format, but its most glaring weakness is obviously its vulnerability to Fighting-types. Fortunately, it's best used as a Fake Out user, so why not pair it up with a Psychic-type to take care of those? A Psychic-type such as Steven's Metagross, perhaps. That... was a somewhat intriguing idea, but Steven is just a wee bit overused at this point, and his Metagross's bizarre EV spread and shoddy accuracy annoyed me to no end while I was using it alongside Greninja / Garde and would annoy me now.
But wait, Wally's Gallade is a Psychic-type too, isn't it? And I really like Mega Gallade, so...
But Wally's team is terrible... setup and support moves galore, biiiiig red flag.
Nah I'm bored and want to try something different, it's only multi after all lol, it might be fun, and even if I were to get serious, multi is not like triples, where you require about seventy hours to accomplish something even remotely of note, lol.
Alright—what backup should I use? What patches up an obvious hole in Mega Kangaskhan + Mega Gallade?
Hmmm... getting rid of opposing Fighting-types via Fake Out + Mega Gallade sounds cute and all, but what if there are dual Fighting-type leads? After all, Mega Kangaskhan is known to not really be able to run Protect, so you can't humiliate them the way you'd usually do... How are you gonna fix that?
Gee, idk, use a Ghost-type switch option?
Brilliant, what kind of Ghost-type?
Pffff, I have also this Gengar collecting dust here, how about that one?
Sure, why not, let's do it.
...and naturally such a lead pairing also appreciates something that can kill opposing Ghost-types, but otherwise it was really this straightforward initially. I started playing only the day before yesterday, and I decided to wing it from here and see what needed patching up as I went along, but as it turned out Khan + Gengar was mostly on point—the main thing I would have wanted to patch up, but couldn't for very obvious reasons, was Magnezone's Electric STAB move. On my first run, it was clear that Khan + Gengar did what I wanted them to do, and Gallade exceeded my expectations—until I ended up in battle 40-something, which had a difficult matchup and eventually came down to fresh Khan + fresh Mag against fresh Latios2 + fresh Protean Greninja4. It went something like this:
- Khan KOes Latios with Sucker Punch;
- Greninja hits Khan for over 50% with Hydro Pump;
- Mag's (obviously fatal) Thunder misses Greninja;
- Khan hits (Water-type) Greninja for over 50% with Sucker Punch;
- Greninja KOes Khan with Hydro Pump;
- Mag paralyzes Greninja with Thunder Wave;
- Mag's (obviously fatal) Thunder misses Greninja;
- Greninja hits Mag for over 50% with Hydro Pump;
- Mag's (obviously fatal) Thunder misses Greninja;
- Greninja KOes Mag with Hydro Pump.
So, yeah, while grumbling something along the lines of "0,88^4 * 0,3^3 * 0,75^2 = 0,0091" I set out on new runs and lost both of them to similar (but not as ridiculous) scenarios. Luck was on my side today, however:
12:22:31: <Lumari> fucking ridiculous lol
12:22:53: <Lumari> unfortunate matchup ends with 13 HP Gengar facing off against full health nidoqueen4 and an unknown backup
12:23:20: <Lumari> shadow ball for like 45%, dragon tail misses
12:23:29: <Lumari> shadow ball crit
12:23:33: <Lumari> lastmon lilligant
12:23:48: <Lumari> nice to have things go in my favour instead of having three thunders miss :p
This is the battle referenced: JF6G-WWWW-WW2T-9KXC (there were questionable plays on my side too), and everyone complaining about hax screwing them over (yes I'm aware that includes me here) should watch this cause it provides a nice counterbalance—and apparently I had a good day today. I lost that 40-something run and a 30-something run Wednesday, lost another 30-something run yesterday, and was at it... a bit longer... today. I have ditched my ridiculous >100 battles per day rhythm from March and don't tend to clock in more than like 20 these days, but AI multi kinda forces you to do the whole thing in one sitting because your partner's lead is randomly chosen as you resume your streak—so it might very well happen that you pause at 100 and lose at 101 because in all his wisdom Wally decided to lead with Magnezone and throw all your momentum down the drain. An extremely glaring bit of bad design that I'm still mad about. I had to take a break after the chatelaine battle because that one filled up my VS recorder, but by battle 52 I had Gallade back in the lead position and didn't leave the arena until my loss :T which included misplays, probably from playing too many battles on one day, but hey, what can ya do.
When I started playing with Steven, I expected his team to... cooperate. It didn't. While I did reach 73, it felt as if I was winging it all along, and every turn had me cross my fingers to see if his mons would pick the appropriate move or even hit. It was less like that this time. While very far from perfect, Wally's Pokemon--or at the very least Gallade--actually seemed to know what was expected of them. I liked it.
So, without further ado, meet not Steven's squad:
Gallade @ Galladite
Ability: Steadfast
Nature: Adamant
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/31
EVs: 252 Atk / 252 Spe
- Close Combat
- Psycho Cut
- Leaf Blade
- Swords Dance
Gallade is actually really good! In a sense, it's like the opposite of Steven's Aerodactyl... that one should be reliable because it has only attacking moves, but as mentioned above, due to its disgustingly low damage output, it tends to screw up altogether and make the dumbest errors—Gallade, on the other hand, has Swords Dance, which is usually a big red flag because god knows when it'll consider it a good idea to set one up, but it just... doesn't really seem to use it? Like, I do recall a /couple/ battles where I lost Gallade because it decided to set up an SD in the face of a Dragonite or something, but generally it opted to hit things, and hit them hard... because unlike Aerodactyl, it actually can. Mega Gallade has plenty of guaranteed and potential KOs to go after, and it will do so, and it won't have trouble making up its mind in the process. Its moveset is fine, I guess.... Close Combat is obvious and mandatory, praise Azelf for Game Freak being considerate here and giving Gallade Psycho Cut instead of Zen Headbutt, and while Leaf Blade isn't objectively the best fit in terms of type coverage (that would be Knock Off), Mega Khan and Gengar generally help out fine in that area, and Grass coverage comes in pretty handy in the Maison with all the Curse-using Water / Ground types and nasty stuff like Barbaracle and Carracosta roaming free. I guess I would have preferred an alternate coverage move over Swords Dance, just to save Gallade from itself, but as mentioned it didn't have that many trouble using it properly... if it did boost, it was generally against an isolated foe like Dusknoir—in other words, when it needed to! in most cases
Otherwise, unlike Steven's Metagross, this EV spread actually makes sense, and while I would have preferred a Jolly nature, there is a lot of utility in having Mega Khan attack first... again, to save Gallade from itself. First example that comes to mind is smashing Probopass, Aggron, and Tyranitar with Low Kick before Gallade screws itself over by leaving them at 1 HP. I like this set. It's a nice set.
Magnezone @ Air Balloon
Ability: Magnet Pull
Nature: Modest
IVs: 31/31/31/31/31/31
EVs: 252 SpA / 252 SpD
- Thunder
- Flash Cannon
- Thunder Wave
- Reflect
There... are a couple things I would have done differently with this set, mildly speaking. Thunder is a horrible, horrible move—Thunderbolt would have been infinitely better—and giving a Pokemon that's only used against foes that don't switch Magnet Pull instead of Sturdy or Analytic is just mean. Thunder Wave and Reflect are other moves you'll just have to hope it won't pick. In practice, it fortunately turned out to be capable of making somewhat intelligent decisions (and let's be real here, it doesn't matter if it uses Thunder Wave against a faster last foe), but these are dead moveslots if it picks the moves it should be picking, and it did tend to use Thunder Wave in mid-game situations where it really should be more concerned about finishing off foes—and did I mention that Thunder is suuuuuch a horrible move :[ I think I get the (admittedly sound) rationale behind pairing up Gallade with Zone, but it's a bit hard to check Flying-types reliably with only 70% accuracy T__T If things go as planned Magnezone shouldn't be on the field for that many turns (or any at all, really), so it wouldn't get as many chances to screw up, but the several close calls and/or losses do make me wonder what Wally's team would have been capable of had this thing simply been running Thunderbolt, as it should be.
.....and their Very Professionally Chosen Henchmen, no nicknames sadly cause forgot about them, can't interrupt the streak, and it's only multi lol:
Kangaskhan @ Kangaskhanite
Ability: Scrappy
Nature: Jolly
IVs: 31/31/31/X/31/31
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
- Fake Out
- Double-Edge
- Sucker Punch
- Low Kick
Standard doubles Khan, I guess? Jolly is definitely better than Adamant here because you can't pick your matchups are carefully as in singles, so you'll just need to outspeed as much as possible, and there's no Earthquake to OHKO Tyrantrum4 with. Fake Out and Sucker Punch are self explanatory, and I used Double-Edge over Return because "moar power"—I needed to do something to make up for the power loss from giving up on Adamant, after all. I haven't kept track of this properly because these streaks were such a rush, but there are many KOs that Double-Edge gains over Return—foe Kangaskhan is a notable one that comes to mind. It's worth noting that a neutral Double-Edge is stronger than a super effective Sucker Punch, so often I'll use Sucker Punch just to bypass the recoil, heh. Finally, for sheer damage output, Low Kick is by a very wide margin the best Fighting-type move available; Drain Punch is always outdamaged by Double-Edge (even Return) or Low Kick, and PuP isn't used for damage output and Khan is strong enough as is. I mean, I guess I don't really /need/ to specifically OHKO Tyrantrum when I have a freaking Mega Gallade available, but I want the best option to do what Double-Edge fails to do, which is slaughter Rock- and Steel-types. Scrappy is the icing on the cake, allowing Mega Khan to somewhat combat Ghost-types before Mega Evolving; it's not great, mostly because regular Khan isn't great, but preventing Ghost-types from setting up TR and actually being able to hit Spiritomb with my leads is pretty nifty.
Gengar is here to switch in on double Fighting-types, to provide extra insurance against Ghost-types—which Khan and Gallade really don't like facing, with Gallade being weak to them and Khan only being able to hit them with Sucker Punch—and for just being a generally good mon. The EV spread is standard, as is Focus Sash, which has good synergy with Destiny Bond and Protect; Shadow Ball has excellent neutral coverage, Sludge Bomb is more powerful, hits Normal-types, and hits Fairy-types super effectively, and Protect is Protect. Running Destiny Bond on a last Pokemon is, in all honesty, probably just as stupid as it sounds, but a 1 HP Gengar should generally be a more tempting target for the AI than Magnezone, and it's not like there's /that/ much else that can be run in this slot... Dazzling Gleam might work for a generic spread move, and Icy Wind provides nice speed control—but no matter how much I like to fangirl over that move with Weavile / Mega Gardevoir / Gastrodon / Scizor and while Adamant Mega Gallade and Magnezone definitely are partners that would benefit from it, it's just way too hard to pull off reliably if said partners don't run Protect and are controlled by an AI. The only other option I actually considered was Gravity (yes, seriously) because lol Thunder's accuracy and it's not like you're using that slot /that/ often, but that was before I realised Gengar doesn't even get that move lol, and Destiny Bond was a nice panic button to have, so whatever really.
The loss was simply a tough battle against a tough matchup with a couple misplays that proved themselves fatal and a bit of hax that was decisive but shouldn't have been allowed to happen in the first place.
turn 1
vs.
Tough foes... Dusknoir can set up Trick Room, but Gyarados will snowball out of control real soon. I guess I could have tried preventing TR with Scrappy Fake Out, but especially since Gyarados has Intimidate, Dusknoir isn't gonna go anywhere soon. Khan hits Gyarados for ~60% with Double-Edge while Gallade attacks Dusknoir—Gyarados sets up DD, Dusknoir sets up TR.
turn 2
vs.
First real misplay: assuming Gyarados will keep on boosting, I switch out Kangaskhan for Gengar to hit it at my leisure—Gyarados heals back to full while Dusknoir hits Gallade and Gallade inflicts some more damage on Dusknoir. I should have known it wouldn't boost further—it "outsped" everything and thus wouldn't have felt the need to. Even then, just KOing it would have been best, lol.
turn 3
vs.
I do what makes sense and have Gengar hammer away at Gyarados, which misses Aqua Tail on Gallade while Dusknoir heals back a bit and breaks Gengar's Sash with Pain Split.
turn 4
vs.
Dark clouds gather as Dusknoir removes Gallade with Destiny Bond and Gyarados KOes Gengar...
turn 5
vs.
Last turn of TR, and a misplay by targeting Latias, which uses Calm Mind, with Sucker Punch—Khan would have outsped and OHKOed any of sets 2-4, and Sucker Punch shouldn't be used against set 1 in the first place. Magnezone is more aware of what needs to be done and KOes Gyarados.
turn 6
vs.
Khan hits Latias hard with Double-Edge, Latias boosts further, Glaceon's Blizzard misses Khan but his Mag without any cold consequences. Mag paralyzes Glaceon instead of simply removing it, as it should do :T
turn 7
vs.
Latias dodges an otherwise fatal hit and recovers back to nearly full while Magnezone removes Glaceon.
turn 8-13
vs.
Latias survives Double-Edge + Flash Cannon by the skin of its teeth and KOes Khan. From here on out, there's not a chance in hell with a faster Latias with access to Recover at +2 SpD against Wally's Magnezone—and thus an interesting run ends after 145 battles, and I miss out on doubling my Greninja / Gardevoir / Steven record by literally one battle lol.
It's unlikely that I'll go on a new run with these guys—the matchup luck factor in AI multi is honestly unreal, having to run suboptimal teams by default, and when the AI's unreliability and preference for unreliable moves is thrown in the mix too, the format becomes so high variance that a team's "true potential" becomes more nebulous and relative than I'd like it to be—and if there's no ceiling to shoot for, I have trouble thinking up a reason other than fun why I'm even playing. This was a "just for fun" team thrown together to use a couple mons that would just be collecting dust otherwise alongside a partner other than Steven, and it actually ended up cranking out a decent number. Nifty, but judging by my previous runs, and especially how they ended, there was a huge component here of outrunning AI-related bad luck longer than otherwise, and I cannot minimise that as much as I'd like to and actually am capable of in other formats.
I mean, I'm definitely not angry like I was in that quote above haha, and if Wally apparently works too there's more room for creativity than I thought... Nevertheless, this is still multi we're talking about :I and I also don't like the prospect of having to do 150+ battles in one day, much less in one sitting u_u
holy crap it's been a while since I got to do one of these—and "five Lansat Berries" and "making Wally work" admittedly sounds kinda cool. Still, it's pretty small fry compared to actual big fish like that other Kangaskhan / Gengar streak two posts above, heh. I like frying big fish too, though—did it a couple times in March, felt good—and what made it feel especially good was that I used non-standard choices, and while not much of a big fish this time, I hope that's what this setup qualifies as.
Stay tuned for a more researchy post as well, if those are your cup of tea :]
You and I have the same kind of luck with ORAS multis, Dutch. I had a fucking hell of a time even reaching 50 with that game, maddeningly so when looking at the teams and streaks posted by some other people (making it clear that they never fought one of like twelve different pokes that demolish their lead and outspeed Metagross.) Whereas in X, I had a partner with CB Slaking3 and Chandelure 3; pretty bad sets on their own, but Slaking took hits like a Slaking does and unlike Aerodactyl, its shitty moveset OHKOd like 85% of the Maison, so I was happy to let it pick Giga Impact/EQ and kill whatever I didn't.
Rest assured that someone else shared all of your pain :P
Yeaaah I reached multis by dual-wielding 3DS's, because playing with Steven was a nightmare. Mostly because I wasn't allowed to take a break due to random lead and ain't nobody got time for that.
Good to see a reasonable streak achieved with a non-Steven team, though - I posted several months ago a comment about how all the streaks used Steven in a kind of attempt to be thought-provoking like "hey, Steven's not the only partner!", and it's cool to finally see one that doesn't use Steven. Cool stuff!
Now that I finally got around to getting there, I'm posting my ongoing streak of 3000 wins in XY Super Singles with Team Plaguarism (Whimsicott/Durant/Drapion).
Battle video (which was extremely uneventful, but it featured me getting ALL of my SpAtk and Accuracy boosts in the first ten Acupressures!): FJEG-WWWW-WW2T-YDVY
I was at around 2790 wins before I started with Mega Salamence/Aegislash/Chansey. Most of this was pretty uneventful. I had one battle that I theoretically COULD have lost if Tyranitar had gotten a hit on Durant (it was a highly unusual circumstance that happened months ago and I forgot to save it). I had a recent battle that made me nervous because I forgot how to play against lead Medicham (that's what happens when you don't play for a long time), but I managed to pull through. Otherwise, it was business as usual; this team is bonkers, Drapion wins at life, and stalling out Cobalion3 is hilarious. Special props go to the non-Poison Heal Breloom4 who started the battle with Protect, allowing me to just Encore it to death rather than risking an Effect Spore hit when Durant attacks with Aerial Ace.
Nice job on the Multis streak, The Dutch Plumberjack! And, of course, turskain puts up some ridiculous numbers; the way he's cracked the Rotations format is astounding, given how the rest of us are all completely floundering in it (relatively speaking). Perish Song to exploit the AI is freaking brilliant. I look forward to hearing more from NoCheese about his Singles run!
I am looking for take way delphox,since kangaskhan and garchomp are doing well
I was able to get only 30 victories in a row
Lost 4 times
2 due to hipnosis + focus sash gengar.Once garchomp and khan are sleep there is nothing I can do
1 due to confusion hax curse moonlight umbreon
1 due because i was very stupid
Teams used: Team Leer (#0001 - #1000, 50 battles afterwards beginning at around #1320 - 1050 wins total)
Tailwind Salamence for Triples (most of #1001 - #2000, with Team Leer and Friend Guard Double FEAR used four around fifty battles each - 900 wins total)
Double FEAR with Friend Guard (~50 battles, beginning from battle #1271)
Tailwind Salamence for Triples
I formatted these in the format used by the Showdown Calculator's Import Team feature to import them for easier calcs.
USP Talon (Weavile) @ Focus Sash
Ability: Pressure
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Level: 50
Jolly Nature
- Beat Up
- Ice Punch
- Fake Out
- Protect
This team started as a Triples adaptation of Salamence/Hitmonlee/Sylveon/Scizor.
First, I scrapped Hitmonlee for Weavile due to Hitmonlee being unable to spare a moveslot for Protect, which is too good to pass up on in Triples.
Then I needed a second Fake Out user to finish the leads. I'd done theorymon on Weavile/Salamence/Infernape prior to ORAS's release (which ended up becoming the Mega Gardevoir team I used in XY) - but I rejected Infernape because of it sharing a weakness to Water-type threats with Salamence. I thought about bringing back Hitmonlee, but it could not afford to lose Focus Sash due to Weavile already using it.
Looking at the list of Pokémon that learn Fake Out, I eventually arrived at Raichu. It would have Electric STAB to take out waters; it has base 110 Speed; its Earthquake weakness lets it bait effectively; and Intimidate could buffer its horrifying 60/55 physical defenses a little. Lightning Rod support would also be excellent to have, even if the team wasn't especially scared of Roller Skaters. Its offensive stats were a problem, though - 90 Special Attack is nothing to write home about. To augment that, I gave it Magnet for the held item, which pushed its damage to usable levels.
Then, for the sixth slot, I grabbed Terrakion for a TerraCott mode, since I was running Beat Up on Weavile already.
I played a few dozen battles using Magnet Raichu with TB/GK/FO/Protect and Wide Lens Terrakion as the 6th; I was sold on Raichu, but Terrakion didn't do much and I only got to deploy TerraCott on one occasion. I searched for a replacement that was immune to EQ in order to provide a better switch option for Raichu, and synergized with the rest of the team - Gyarados fit the bill on paper with its typing, and more Intimidate couldn't hurt. Its Speed wasn't great, but as this was a Tailwind team, there were solutions to that. I went for a Choice Band set using Waterfall/EQ/Return/Crunch.
With this version of the team, I played ~650 battles. Raichu and Gyarados worked as intended - but Raichu sometimes lacked on its moves, especially Grass Knot. A calc:
252 SpA Raichu Grass Knot (100 BP) vs. 0 HP / 252 SpD Rampardos: 106-126 (61.6 - 73.2%)
252 SpA Aerilate Mega Salamence Hyper Voice vs. 0 HP / 252 SpD Rampardos: 42-49 (24.4 - 28.4%)
Thunderbolt also fell short at times, such as on Kingdra which Hyper Voice + Thunderbolt failed to KO, even with Fake Out chip damage. I'd briefly entertained the thought of Volt Tackle Raichu before for the outrageous 120 base power, but rejected it due to Raichu's awful physical movepool and Lightning Rod boosting Special Attack, which would be wasted on a physical set. But the power started to seem tempting, and even if Raichu didn't benefit from Lightning Rod boosts, the redirection would still be valuable. Since Grass Knot ended up falling just a bit short, maybe it didn't need a coverage move that badly - instead, it could run Encore or Helping Hand for support and stick to just Volt Tackle for its attacking move.
The prospect of seriously using Volt Tackle still sounded ridiculous, but at this point I had to breed it. I didn't have HA Pikachu in GenV, so I had to breed it the painful way in genVI with a 1/25 chance for the offspring to have the target nature. Howewer, I got really lucky with the breed and landed a Jolly Volt Tackle Raichu with Lightning Rod and the right IVs in less than 3 boxes, on the first Jolly-nature hatch.
I ran a Volt Tackle/Helping Hand/Fake Out/Protect set on Raichu at this point, which turned out to be effective - Helping Hand was useful both for boosting Mega Salamence and Sylveon, with HH Hyper Voice under Tailwind being a particulaly funny option.
I'd also noticed that Choice Band was not ideal for Gyarados with none of its moves being fantastic ones to lock into, and swapped items with Scizor to fix that, bringing in Choice Band Scizor and giving Gyarados Life Orb with a Dragon Dance set instead. As a side effect, Scizor was now slower than Heatran - but the Triples version of the team was not as weak to it as before, with Gyarados serving as a dedicated counter.
Volt Tackle/Helping Hand Raichu and LO Gyarados/CB Scizor were the final changes to the team, made around the 1700-win mark. I think the prior versions were also effective and sometimes I missed having Grass Knot, but overall I think Volt Tackle worked out for the better.
As a team with a spread attacker center surrounded by Fake Out supports, the archetype is a pretty standard Fake Out romp. What sets it apart from the rest is Tailwind Salamence alongside a Specs Sylveon back-up to carry a Tailwind mode in addition to just attacking things.
But to address the mouse in the room: Raichu without Sash. What reason is there to use it over anything else that learns Fake Out?
It hits Water-types that Mega Salamence has trouble with a super-effective STAB. Only Shiftry and Ludicolo can match this, and they both have problems with their typing and speed.
Lightning Rod is a really good ability. While it isn't nearly as important as on teams with Electric-weak leads, absorbing Thunder Wave and neutralizing many Electric-types that wall Mega Salamence is very useful. Gyarados loves Lightning Rod support as well. For Lightning Rod purposes, I run Raichu in the right-side position (slot #3) to abuse the Storm Drain/Lightning Rod AI bug in Triples - thanks to the positioning, the AI's center and right positions will repeatedly use Electric-type attacks regardless of Lightning Rod, instead of using different moves after spotting the ability.
It has base 110 Speed, which is very fast.
With the Zap Plate, its Volt Tackle hits really hard and allows it to provide respectable offense.
Intimidate buffers its 60/55/80 defenses to the point where it can survive softer neutral hits when using Fake Out; Volt Tackle recoil will throw away its life very quickly, but it can still work as Protect bait.
Raichu's Electric-typing gives it only one weakness, which contributes to the previous point. It can bait Earthquake and allow Gyarados to switch in on the likes of Donphan safely.
Finally, Helping Hand is chosen as the coverage move due to Raichu's horrible physical movepool aside from Volt Tackle. It boosts Salamence's Hyper Voice to deal increased damage against Ground-types and other targets Volt Tackle wouldn't be great against. It can also boost Sylveon Hyper Voice for some ridiculous damage numbers. Scizor's CB Bullet Punch also occasionally benefits.
Beat Up Weavile OHKOs Froslass, doesn't make contact, and deals very consistent damage; but it suffers when allies are KO'd or inflicted with status. With an Intimidate lead, Knock Off would also miss KOs on White Herb holders such as Lati@s1 thanks to Intimidate removing the item. On this team, Beat Up's total base power is 96 (17 + 19 + 14 + 18 + 11 + 17). To calculate its damage, I select Tail Slap in the calculator, set its base power to 16 and typing to Dark, set the number of hits to 3, and then double the average between minimum-maximum damage percentages. Since Beat Up has 6 hits with separate damage rolls on each, its damage output is very consistent. It also has 6 chances to crit, which gives it a bit of extra punch quite often.
For Gyarados, I went for Adamant max Speed to hit 133 Speed, outspeeding base 80s and hitting 264 under Tailwind to outspeed the entire Maison. The negligible Attack cut was initially for a Choice Band set - on it, it could've used a little more bulk investment. On a Life Orb set, the few extra points of HP aren't that useful with Life Orb ticking away at its health. For its moves, Waterfall/Earthquake are mandatory for the team's coverage. It doesn't have a lot of space to use Earthquake with only Mega Salamence being immune to Ground, but it's necessary even if taking friendly fire at times.
Sylveon, Scizor, Salamence and Weavile are the same sets I've used before. Scizor's EVs are for a Choice Band with slight bulk investment, same as on Lucario/Greninja.
The leads have fair amount of options. In most battles, I attack with Hyper Voice while using Fake Out to disable dangerous opponents and buy Mega Salamence a turn for its Speed to kick in. Setting up Tailwind on Turn 1 while using Fake Out on foes like Aerodactyl4 or or Landorus to go faster is common against them. Salamence can also be sacced to a super-effective attack after it sets up Tailwind to bring in Sylveon safely.
Gyarados is the most common switch option with Intimidate and coverage for both Raichu's and Weavile's weaknesses. Scizor sees a bit less action; Sylveon rarely switches in, instead preferring to get in safely after an ally is knocked out.
While Sylveon works best under Tailwind, it can also stand and deliver without having the speed advantage thanks to its its 95/65/130 bulk, supported by Intimidate from Salamence and Gyarados to augment its Defense. While it is a Tailwind team, the frontline is very fast after Salamence has Mega Evolved with 125, 120 and 110 base Speed on the respective leads, and Scizor mainly uses priority moves, so setting it up is less common than in Doubles - maybe one out of 15-20 battles involve Tailwind usage over going for Hyper Voice right out.
When Raichu doesn't have targets it can hit due to only having a single attacking move, Fake Out on Turn 1 followed by Helping Hand on Turn 2 often allows for Hyper Voice + HH Hyper Voice to snag KOs Salamence would not be able to get otherwise. If Raichu can't contribute, I switch it out to bank its Fake Out and Lightning Rod support. Switching out Weavile to preserve it is usually not as useful since its Beat Up suffers heavily in late-game situations due to allies being KO'd, but if it can be done for free it's worth it.
Threat-wise, with two Intimidate users, Defiant and Competitive are not fun, but Fake Out can stop them. As the team utilizes two Hyper Voice spammers, Soundproof is a bigger problem than usual with Abomasnow, Bouffalant and Exploud as the dangerous offenders. Mr. Mime4 is frail enough to be OHKO'd by both Weavile and Raichu; Electrode is walled by Lightning Rod.
Dragonite deserves special mention, as it can have Inner Focus to prevent Fake Out flinches or Multiscale to avoid being OHKO'd by Ice Punch while threatening most of the team. Its threat level decreases rapidly with Intimidate, however.
Heatran is less of a problem than in Doubles, but it's still difficult to handle for most of the team. Heatran2 with White Herb can also OHKO Raichu with Overheat. Gyarados counters Heatran if it lives.
Glaceon4 is very threatening if it dodges Fake Out, as Salamence will die right out. Against it, saccing Salamence to set up Tailwind or using Protect on Salamence may be more safe depending on the situation. Walrein4 survives Volt Tackle and is a pest, but can usually be overpowered. For Donphan4, Intimidate and Fake Out control it quite well in addition to Raichu being able to bait it.
Opposing Lightning Rod users can completely shut down Raichu, while Hyper Voice is also useless against the Electric-types that carry it. Pokémon like Zapdos and Thundurus can be stopped cold by Lightning Rod, but depending on the situation or set, Raichu might not be able to stay on the field. Against Zapdos2, Gyarados baiting Charge Beam and going for the KO or DDs while Raichu blocks it with Lightning Rod is a good end-game plan if both are kept alive.
Wide Guard is rarely seen, but with two Hyper Voice spammers it can get very ugly. Mienshao4 can have Inner Focus to Wide Guard even if Fake Out is used on it. The leads have a lot of trouble KOing Bastiodon4, and you want to bring in either Gyarados or Scizor to take it out. Regigigas4 is difficult to KO and obnoxious, but quite rare.
The leads don't do well against Rock-types that resist Hyper Voice and have enough physical bulk to ignore Weavile and Raichu. Scizor and Gyarados can handle them and Sylveon can blast them with Hyper Voice, but switching isn't always easy. In combination with Bastiodon4 using Wide Guard to stop Earthquake and Hyper Voice, they can get very obnoxious. Regirock is especially bad - with Clear Body, it ignores Intimidate and all of its sets are threatening. Rhyperior4 is quite bulky, can have Solid Rock to increase its bulk further, or carry Lightning Rod to shut down Raichu.
Trick Room very rarely goes up with two Fake Out users, STAB Beat Up, and Volt Tackle taking out Slowthings. I had little trouble with it during the streak.
Because of Raichu's Lightning Rod support, Thunder Wave is much less of a problem than usual, and many of the usual Thunder Wave users can be ignored. Raichu only redirects the center and right positions from the right, though, so Electric attacks can still slip through from the left-side position. Raichu can Shift into the center to counteract this, but beware that in the center, the AI recognizes its Lightning Rod properly and stops using Electric-type moves. Raichu's bulk can also prevent it from surviving long enough to redirect attacks. Raichu's Lightning Rod support is not as reliable as that of Mega Manectric, but while it is useful the team is not entirely dependent on it. Against the rare Discharge (mostly on Thundurus4), Raichu being in the right-side position will not stop the AI from using it, which can be dangerous.
Turn 0
Veteran Isabella sent out Regice, Latias and Terrakion
I sent out Weavile, Salamence and Raichu
Intimidate hits the opponents
vs.
Intimidate did not activate White Herb, so I know that Latias is not Set1. I went for Protect on Weavile and Salamence to scout, since I was scared of a potential Scarf Terrakion and wanted to get Salamence up to speed. On Raichu, I went for Volt Tackle on Regice, predicting that it wouldn't get attacked.
Turn 1
Weavile used Protect
Salamence used Protect
Latias used Draco Meteor on Raichu - Raichu KO, -2 SAtk
Terrakion used Sacred Sword - Protect
Regice used Ice Beam - Protect
I sent out Scizor to replace Raichu
vs.
The opening backfires, getting Raichu killed as it loses the Speed tie and gets targeted with Specs Meteor. Terrakion is slower and uses Sacred Sword, revealing it to be either Set3 or Set4.
The Protects didn't really do much since I have to switch Salamence out at this point anyway to get it out of Ice Beam.
Turn 2
Switch out Weavile for Gyarados - Intimidate activates
Switch out Salamence for Sylveon
Scizor used Bullet Punch on Regice - 40%
Latias used Draco Meteor on Gyarados - critical hit, Gyarados KO, -4 SAtk
Terrakion used Sacred Sword on Sylveon - 90%
Regice used Ice Beam on Sylveon - 65%
I sent out Weavile to replace Gyarados
40%
vs.
65%
The switches also backfire, thanks to Latias mysteriously targeting the Weavile slot and getting a crit on top, instead of Sylveon absorbing Meteor as I intended. Calcs in retrospect:
-2 252 SpA Choice Specs Latias Draco Meteor vs. 4 HP / 4 SpD Mega Salamence: 162-192 (94.7 - 112.2%) -- 62.5% chance to OHKO
-2 252 SpA Choice Specs Latias Draco Meteor vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Weavile: 84-100 (57.5 - 68.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
The AI probably went for Weavile due to the KO on Salamence not being certain, though even so, it seems pretty unlucky - especially with the crit on top.
I go for Fake Out on Terrakion to avoid any funny business like Rock Slide flinches. In retrospect, Protect would have kept Weavile at full HP as Rock Slide was very unlikely with Terrakion at -2 while absorbing Sacred Sword and Draco Meteor.
Turn 3
Weavile used Fake Out on Terrakion
Scizor used Bullet Punch on Regice - Regice KO
Latias used Draco Meteor on Weavile - 60%
Terrakion flinched
Sylveon used Hyper Voice - Latias KO, Terrakion KO
Isabella sent out Zapdos to replace Regice, Latios to replace Latias, and Raikou to replace Terrakion
vs.
60%
65%
After the disastrous start, Sylveon finally snags some KOs. The back-ups aren't too bad - Sylveon can bust through with Hyper Voice and with a low-HP Weavile, it probably isn't getting targeted.
I go for Bullet Punch + Ice Punch on Latios to get some damage on it in case of Set2, or just get the KO in case of something like Dragon Dance happening if disaster strikes.
Turn 4
Scizor used Bullet Punch on Latios - 50%
Weavile used Ice Punch on Latios - Latios KO
Raikou used Thunderbolt on Sylveon - critical hit, 10%
Zapdos used Heat Wave - miss Scizor, Sylveon KO
I sent out Salamence to replace Sylveon
Empty center position
vs.
60%
It got worse - Sylveon somehow not only got targeted by Thunderbolt, but was also hit critically, without which Heat Wave would not have been able to KO it afterwards. Retrospect calc:
252 SpA Raikou Thunderbolt vs. 4 HP / 0 SpD Weavile: 81-96 (55.4 - 65.7%)
In the battle, Weavile's exact HP was somewhere in the 80s. Like with Salamence earlier, Raikou probably didn't have a guaranteed KO on Weavile, and did something unexpected due to bad luck.
If Weavile was attacked, Sylveon could likely win the battle on the next turn with another Hyper Voice, or weaken the opposition enough for Salamence to clean up if it got KO'd before getting off another. Zapdos could be either Set4 or Set2 at this point, as the damage that KO'd Sylveon didn't reveal the set and it missed on Scizor.
The position I'm in now is quite bad. Raikou is bulky enough to require two Flamethrowers and one Ice Punch to guarantee the KO - this is a situation where Knock Off would be preferred over Beat Up. I need to keep Weavile alive to finish off Zapdos, so I go for Protect, hoping that Raikou will target it this time.
Turn 5
Weavile used Protect
Scizor used Bullet Punch on Zapdos - critical hit, 65%
Raikou used Thunderbolt on Weavile - Protect
Salamence used Flamethrower on Raikou - 75%
Zapdos used Heat Wave on Salamence and Scizor - Salamence 85%, Scizor 10%
75% Empty center position
75%
vs.
60%
85%
10%
Zapdos is revealed to be Set2 with Bullet Punch damage and Scizor's survival. It also has HP/SDef EVs, with which it completely wall Mega Salamence whose Flamethrower deals 20% minimum to it. Hitting it with Ice Punch is the only way I can win the battle at this point.
Regarding Scizor's survival, the EV spread survives +0 Zapdos2 Heat Wave 100% of the time. The earlier miss was helpful.
Turn 6
Scizor used Bullet Punch on Zapdos - 45%
Weavile used Ice Punch on Raikou - 10%
Salamence used Flamethrower on Raikou - Raikou KO
Zapdos used Heat Wave on Scizor and Salamence - Scizor KO, miss Salamence
45%
60%
85%
After finishing off Raikou, I can finally start trying to deal with Zapdos. Due to the positioning, I need to Shift Weavile in order to be able to attack Zapdos. Howewer, Weavile can't survive Heat Wave (now at 100% power to boot due to only having a single target), so I have to protect it by Shifting Salamence to tank Heat Wave.
Turn 7
Shift Weavile into the center
Salamence used Tailwind
Zapdos used Roost - 95%
95%
vs.
85%
60%
This really isn't looking good. Ice Punch deals ~70%, so I will need several attacks to KO Zapdos.
Turn 8
Weavile used Ice Punch on Zapdos - miss
Shift Salamence into the center
Zapdos used Heat Wave on Salamence - 70%
95%
vs.
60%
70%
The Shift play is working, keeping Weavile safe from Heat Wave. But thanks to BrightPowder (with +0 Evasion at this point), Zapdos dodges Ice Punch anyway and puts me back in square one, except with a nearly full-HP Zapdos that might now use Charge Beam or Double Team as I have no option other than repeating the Shift play.
Turn 9
Shift Weavile into the center
Salamence used Flamethrower - it failed
Zapdos used Double Team - +1 Evasion
95%, +1 Evasion
vs.
70%
60%
With Double Team, things are only looking worse. I preferably need two Ice Punches to secure the KO, which is only getting less likely.
Turn 10
Weavile used Ice Punch on Zapdos - miss
Shift Salamence into the center
Zapdos used Heat Wave on Salamence - 55%, Salamence burnt
95%, +1 Evasion
vs.
60%
55% BRN
With a second miss and a burn on Salamence, the situation just got that much worse. With Salamence resisting Heat Wave, I could have kept doing these Shift plays for some time - but the damage from burn will rapidly KO Salamence. After one more Ice Punch, Salamence is as good as dead and I have to start hitting attacks.
Turn 11
Shift Weavile into the center
Salamence used Flamethrower - it failed
Zapdos used Double Team - +2 Evasion
Salamence takes burn damage
95%, +2 Evasion
vs.
40% BRN
60%
Two evasion boosts - it only gets worse, and this is the last "free" Ice Punch I am getting thanks to the burn.
Turn 12
Weavile used Ice Punch on Zapdos - miss
Shift Salamence into the center
Zapdos used Heat Wave on Salamence - 20%
Salamence takes burn damage
95%, +2 Evasion
vs.
60%
10% BRN
Ice Punch misses for the third time in a row. The odds just got worse - calcs:
252 Atk Weavile Ice Punch vs. 252 HP / 0+ Def Zapdos: 128-152 (64.9 - 77.1%)
252 SpA Mega Salamence Flamethrower vs. 252 HP / 252 SpD Zapdos: 41-49 (20.8 - 24.8%)
The prior damage Scizor dealt helps, but I will need both Flamethrower and Ice Punch hit followed by a high damage roll on Ice Punch.
Turn 13
Salamence used Flamethrower on Zapdos - Zapdos 75%, Zapdos burnt
Zapdos used Charge Beam on Salamence - Salamence KO
Zapdos takes burn damage
Auto-center!
60%, BRN, +2 Evasion
vs.
60%
RNGesus calls it in my favor at last - with the timely burn inflicting chip damage, Zapdos is now a guaranteed KO for Ice Punch. Time to cross fingers for the final blow...
Turn 14
Weavile used Ice Punch on Zapdos - Zapdos KO
I win!
Empty
vs.
60%
Get fucked, Zapdos2. After poor luck for the entire battle, it finally pulls together and saves the streak.
I made several misplays during the battle:
1. Turn 1 as the biggest one, with no benefit and losing Raichu right out. There were many better options I would've had, such as going for Fake Out on Terrakion and Latias while setting up Tailwind and saccing Salamence to Regice, then blowing up the field with Sylveon. With Lightning Rod, I'm not too worried about Regice's Thunder Wave - Blizzard freezes or Icy Wind speed drops are the worst it could inflict.
2. I could've kept Weavile at full HP by using Protect to bait Sword and Meteor instead of Fake Out later in the battle - Weavile never ended up taking another hit and it didn't end up mattering, but an intact Sash would have bought one more Ice Punch against Zapdos at the end of the battle in case of misses, which could have been crucial.
3. Saccing Salamence to deploy Tailwind on Turn 2 would also have been possible, and avoid switching Sylveon into a possible Ice Beam freeze - switch Gyarados/Tailwind/Protect as the moves, that is. Assuming the CH, Gyarados would still have died, but Tailwind Sylveon would likely have been a safer gameplan than trying to preserve Salamence.
#1342 - 4WNG-WWWW-WW2T-Z6VA vs. Heatran/Cobalion/Latios/Registeel/Zapdos/Latias
A battle against Quick Guard Cobalion4 with Team Leer. I faced this Cobalion twice in the handful of battles I played with it - this was the closer one.
#1971 - JUWW-WWWW-WW2T-CR33 vs. Regice/Latias/Terrakion/Zapdos/Latios/Raikou
The closest battle with this team, warstoried above.
#2000 - DGHW-WWWW-WW2T-ZXNW vs. Thundurus/Regirock/Latios/Cobalion/Entei/Registeel
Proof video.
Double FEAR with Friend Guard
These aren't in the Import Team format since I didn't write a paste for it, and only now wrote it out.
Aron @ Berry Juice
Ability: Sturdy
Level: 1
-Endeavor
-Sunny Day
-Toxic
-Protect
First off, I only used this team for very few battles because I lost faith in it really quickly. So I do not have much experience with it, or things to say aside from "use at your own risk".
The team concept is running a level 1 Endeavor user with the ability Friend Guard that decreases damage taken by allies to 75% - or a 1/3 increase in EHP. With the added bulk, Lum Berry Hypno which is protected from both status and flinches can be used as a Trick Room setter in the center to set the condition extremely reliably thanks to Friend Guard boosting its bulk to Cresselia levels.
That was the intent of the lead trio - I posted theorymon of Aron/Aromatisse/Clefairy earlier, which resulted in this.
In practice, Hypno turned out to be pretty fast (base 67 Speed) for a Trick Room setter, and its Dazzling Gleam had very low damage output and failed to KO any resists. The AI also targeted Hypno much more often than I was comfortable with, even with Friend Guard boosting its bulk and two level 1 partners as bait. I'm not sure why that was - perhaps the AI was not taking Friend Guard into account when making damage calculations for targeting.
The team's match-up against Hex Maniacs was abysmal. With Hypno's Psychic-typing, it was very vulnerable to repeated STAB Shadow Balls combined with the AI's worrying tendency to target it in spite of its Friend Guard-boosted bulk and Lv1 bait. Opposing Trick Room also was a massive problem - the Lv1 partners could not hit Ghosts, and their bait presence did not deter the AI from canceling Trick Room in the few battles I played. The back-line was worthless when Trick Room was not in effect, compounding the issue.
On the good side, Parasect's niche of Spore/Rage Powder/Wide Guard to put enemies to sleep and protect Mega Camerupt with WG/Rage Powder was effective, and the back-ups and double FEAR strategy did well when Trick Room went up. But in the battles I played, encounters with Hex Maniacs were way too volatile to allow for playing the team for any longer.
I don't really know why I had such a bad time with this strategy when other Aron + TR set-ups have succeeded in Triples - admittedly, the sample size is small since I only played for a short time, but what I saw was far riskier than I would gamble a four-digit streak on. It could be Friend Guard not affecting the AI's targeting like I speculated, a downside of running a Trick Room setter in the center position, or somehing else entirely... I didn't do further testing with this team since the brief results were terrible and I didn't want to lose the streak. Maybe I will try it again in Z.
Sorry to end the post on such a low note, but this team just didn't work out as I'd hoped.
This is the closest battle with Team Leer during my triples streak, which is still sitting at 2000 wins. I've no plans to continue the streak for now.
Health percentages are estimates, especially on Articuno which has Leftovers and is a pain to track with the health bar. I had this battle video posted before, but took it down since to make space for new ones. Leer Defense drops are not tracked - they only affected Explosion damage on Heatran on Turn 1.
Turn 0
I sent out Talonflame, Meowstic, and Sawk
Veteran Alfie sent out Articuno, Landorus, and Heatran
vs.
This line-up didn't look very threatening to me. Just an usual day - use Leer, grab KOs on Landorus and Articuno, and call it a day.
Turn 1
Articuno Protect
Meowstic Leer - Heatran hit, Landorus activates White Herb, Articuno Protect
Talonflame uses Brave Bird on Landorus - 30%
Heatran used Dragon Pulse on Talonflame - 40%
Sawk uses Close Combat on Articuno - Protect
Landorus used Explosion - Heatran 50%, Talonflame KO, Meowstic 25%, Sawk 1%
I sent out Scizor to replace Talonflame
Alfie sent out Regice to replace Landorus
50%
vs.
25%
1%
However, I missed the threat of White Herb Landorus4 entirely, on top of Articuno using Protect for its ally's Explosion, avoiding Close Combat from Sawk. As a result, Talonflame is KO'd outright, and Sawk's Sturdy is broken while Meowstic takes a heavy blow. Heatran is revealed to be the Choice Scarf set, and curiously locks into Dragon Pulse over harder-hitting options like Magma Storm on Meowstic.
Heatran is a big problem, as it outspeeds Sawk, and can now KO it with Dragon Pulse. As such, I switch it out to preserve it.
Turn 2
I switched out Sawk for Gastrodon
Meowstic used Leer - Articuno hit, Regice's Clear Body activates, Heatran hit
Scizor used Bullet Punch on Regice - 20%
Heatran used Dragon Pulse on Meowstic - KO
Articuno used Blizzard on Gastrodon - 70%, freeze
Regice used Thunder Wave on Gastrodon - it failed
I sent out Salamence to replace Meowstic
50%
20%
vs.
90%
70%
The turn goes alright, but Gastrodon takes a fair bit of damage from 100% Blizzard, as it is only hitting one target after Meowstic's demise. Regice turns out to be Regice4, and was targeting Meowstic with Thunder Wave - which luckily got redirected to Gastrodon instead of Scizor. Regice has Clear Body, preventing a Leer BP OHKO.
Sawk is still outsped by Heatran, so I send out Salamence in the center.
Turn 3
Scizor used Bullet Punch on Regice - KO
Heatran used Dragon Pulse on Salamence - CH, Salamence KO
Articuno used Blizzard on Gastrodon - miss
Gastrodon thawed out - Gastrodon used Scald on Articuno - 80%, burn inflicted
I sent out Sawk to replace Salamence
Alfie sent out Regirock to replace Regice
50%
70%, BRN
vs.
80%
70%
Regice is finished off, but Salamence being CH'd with Dragon Pulse is very bad. I'm not exactly sure what move I was using on Salamence (aside from it not being Protect) - it's been several months since I played this battle. A good move at this point would've been Return on -2 Defense Heatran, which would have KO'd it as was already weakened in order to allow Sawk to enter the field without being OHKO'd by a faster Heatran - or using Protect to bait, but in a desperate situation like this, going on the offensive wouldn't necessarily have been a bad idea.
The crit OHKO (after Heatran weirdly locked into a non-STAB move on Turn 1) puts me in a very bad spot, as I'm forced to bring out Sawk as my last Pokémon and have no way to prevent Heatran from outspeeding and KOing it. After Sawk goes down, I will have to 2v4 the battle with just Scizor and Gastrodon left, against an AI that can take three moves per turn to my two and has one mystery Pokémon left.
Turn 4
Scizor used Bullet Punch on Regirock - 50%
Heatran used Dragon Pulse on Sawk - KO
Articuno used Blizzard on Gastrodon - miss
Regirock used Earthquake - Heatran KO, Scizor 45%, Gastrodon 45%
Gastrodon used Scald on Regirock - KO
Alfie sent out Cresselia to replace Regirock
60%, BRN
vs.
45% (empty center)
45%
Heatran takes down Sawk, but the AI does something unexpected with the Regirock3 it brought in. KOing its allied Heatran with Earthquake is a very welcome freebie, even though its offensive potential with Dragon Pulse was limited. Scizor would have to use Superpower to KO it while risking Flame Body - and with how close the battle got, any extra damage from Heatran could have turned it into a loss.
With the lucky allied KO from the AI, the battle is now a lot more even, with a manageable 2v2 match-up - Scizor can KO both Cresselia and Articuno with super-effective STAB moves.
Articuno missing with Blizzard on Gastrodon twice by now is also great, as its damage output is pretty high at 100% effectiveness.
Turn 5
Articuno used Tailwind
Cresselia used Swagger on Scizor - Scizor confused
Scizor hit itself in confusion - 15%
Gastrodon used Scald on Cresselia - 85%
85%
50%
vs.
15% (empty center)
45%
Swagger throws a wrench in Scizor's ability to close out the battle. If it hits itself once more, the streak is done for.
Tailwind is a wasted turn for Articuno, as the opponents both outspeed my Pokémon already.
Turn 6
Articuno used Blizzard on Gastrodon - 10%
Cresselia used Round on Gastrodon - 2%
Scizor is confused - Scizor used Bug Bite on Cresselia - KO - stole and ate its Lum Berry - Scizor ate Lum Berry and snapped out of confusion
Gastrodon used Scald on Articuno - 15%
10%, BRN
vs.
5% (empty center)
2%
Scizor manages to hit through confusion, OHKOing Cresselia and stealing Lum Berry with Bug Bite to get rid of its confusion to eliminate any further risk.
Meanwhile, Articuno is being worn down by burn damage.
Turn 7
Articuno used Blizzard on Gastrodon - KO
Scizor used Bug Bite - it failed
Auto-center!
4%, BRN
vs.
5%
Thanks to the tie mechanics in the Maison, I would win if I attacked with Scizor and both Pokémon were KO'd, with Scizor being the last Pokémon to die as Life Orb recoil happens after the attack. But as Articuno is expiring to its burn, I can just use Protect to finish the battle.
Turn 8
Scizor used Protect
Articuno used Blizzard - Protect
Articuno KO from burn damage
I win
Scizor and Gastrodon barely eke out the win, with Scizor claiming two KOs and Gastrodon claiming one, while Landorus exploded, Heatran died to friendly fire from Regirock, and Articuno fell to a burn inflicted by Scald early in the battle.
I misplayed pretty strongly in this battle starting from Turn 1, and I thought I had lost the battle when Heatran CH'd Salamence - but thanks to great luck and bad plays from the AI, Scizor and Gastrodon managed what was essentially a 2v5 comeback, as Sawk, Talonflame, Salamence and Meowstic did not deal any meaningful damage to enemy Pokémon and Landorus blew itself up.
First, congratulations on your streak nonetheless. Your Leer team is fun to read about.
As for the second team and your generally unshared issues, I think they stem almost entirely from you packing way more deadweight than most standard Aron teams do and your putting your setter in the center. That's already one attack which is highly unlikely to target the opposite lv1, and because you already gamble with the AI opting to attack instead of activate TR, you've introduced another factor of dependency which, as you've learned, can burn you pretty badly.
Granted, my own team loses most of its muster outside of TR also, but I don't run two zero-attack sets. Hypno fails as a cleaner for largely the same reason I told you Clefairy was no good- STABless resists are just not going to scrape up that damage, especially when the attacker was geared for defense. Most Aron teams I can recall off the top of my head packed more immediate hyper-offense and their setters included STAB moves off of better- sometimes much better- base SpA. Hypno is packing 73 to Slowbro's 100, for instance.
The AI potentially ignoring Friend Guard is troubling but sounds pretty plausible at this point. I'm also wondering if, in addition to OHKOs, the AI has some sort of preference in its programming to attack the center in triples? I ran Cresselia in the center with my randoms teams, and even with frail shit like Honchkrow on the sidelines (off the top of my head; I know they fought together more than once) the AI ganged upon Cressy *all the time.* Slowbro, meanwhile, was targeted by OHKOs or spread moves meant to kill Aron (or the random Outrage) or not at all. Do you think using standard Triples to run tests would be worthwhile? We not only preserve our super streaks, but a lv50 Tyrunt will still have all the OHKO opportunities on a lv1 Aron as Tyrantrum4 would.
Your theorymoning is so awesome, though. You get ridiculous streaks with teams so different from the norm, and in doing so you've taught us a lot, both about what works and what doesn't, and various quirks in the AI programming. Your team may have already been shipped off to the chopping block, but it was worth using just for that, the learning experience (well, I say that because it didn't cause you to waste nearly 2,000 battles; had this team lost, I'd have kept my mouth shut, heh.)
compared to you only having a like 33% chance of even having a chance at the min 41% suicune and 100% gliscor scenario (it can still ch cune with GK for kicks or use hurrrr for mega hurrrrr “why do I play this game”-dom) [ps, it did this, stupid pokemon lol] [the AI is stupid about grass knot for better or worse, as hurrrrrnadus never used it on 50% HP Suicune. the last comment indicates it actually aimed hurricane at Suicine in practice, making a switch back to Gliscor a bad idea]
and when I got my hands on a lead Hurrrnadus battle vid recently, I just had to put it to the test. Experiment simply consisted of switching the Pokemon below out of Hurrrnadus in a mock battle and seeing what move it used. (also some mons here that should be entirely inconsequential for GK purposes, but a good experiment should include those too (to make sure they actually are inconsequential) amirite)
(ftr I obviously tested all of these at full health, and Jump's assertion of Hurrnadus preferring Hurricane on 50% Cune makes sense due to it being a guaranteed OHKO at that point... and obviously that's something I cannot easily put to the test here lol)
There are some very conspicuous ones here. The Gyarados and Kingdra ones stand out most of course, because Hurricane is frankly still a /lot/ stronger than GK on them yet Tornadus does seem to prefer GK. I had only tested out the first couple ones of these when I made my multis post, so the initial theory was that the AI, uh, overvalues GK's Base Power, to the extent that it becomes blind to a move's real power for BP = 120 or 100. Type effectiveness would be taken into account in the sense that it doesn't want to use GK on a target hit for resisted damage, like Dragonite (the other one I had already tested at that point). It should also be noted that I ran pretty much this entire test on the train, where I didn't have access to a damage calculator or a weight list or whatever, I just knew the weights I happened to know by heart--so I then just assumed Garchomp and Cresselia were hit for 120 BP and my initial hypothesis was correct. Swampert made sense too because 4x weak, and Azumarill and Vaporeon made sense too because "only 60 BP"--and Hurrrnadus did seem to use GK occasionally on heavier Water-types. However, I initially thought it was like "BP over 100=vastly prefers GK, BP below 100=AI's brain works properly," and that was way off.
I still think there is some link to the move's Base Power because it does often end up using it when it's not its strongest move, but I feel that's a really easy answer lol, like of course it would use GK more often if it hits for a higher BP.
Another thing I figured, based on Garchomp's and Cresselia's data, was that "on all neutral hits and with a Base Power of 80 on GK, it's pretty much 50/50 between GK and Hurricane." So then I tested Deoxys-D last minute, but that one ended up refuting that pretty convincingly.
If anyone could see some patters here, that would be appreciated, because I'm frankly stumped and don't want to dismiss them entirely as "stupid" x___x sorry this was all over the place lol. also feel free to bring up some mons that would make sense testing (I pretty much just tested a bunch of things I happened to have battle ready, and I would have liked to test something like Camerupt but I just don't have a good Camerupt yet :p) or that would warrant some additional testing (because I'm aware ten battles per mon is a, uhm, questionable sample size lol)
also stay tuned for further context of this battle etc.
Here we go I guess, although after actually conducting the entirety of the research it looks like my preliminary hypothesis was way off lmao.
Basically, I remembered this
and when I got my hands on a lead Hurrrnadus battle vid recently, I just had to put it to the test. Experiment simply consisted of switching the Pokemon below out of Hurrrnadus in a mock battle and seeing what move it used. (also some mons here that should be entirely inconsequential for GK purposes, but a good experiment should include those too (to make sure they actually are inconsequential) amirite)
(ftr I obviously tested all of these at full health, and Jump's assertion of Hurrnadus preferring Hurricane on 50% Cune makes sense due to it being a guaranteed OHKO at that point... and obviously that's something I cannot easily put to the test here lol)
There are some very conspicuous ones here. The Gyarados and Kingdra ones stand out most of course, because Hurricane is frankly still a /lot/ stronger than GK on them yet Tornadus does seem to prefer GK. I had only tested out the first couple ones of these when I made my multis post, so the initial theory was that the AI, uh, overvalues GK's Base Power, to the extent that it becomes blind to a move's real power for BP = 120 or 100. Type effectiveness would be taken into account in the sense that it doesn't want to use GK on a target hit for resisted damage, like Dragonite (the other one I had already tested at that point). It should also be noted that I ran pretty much this entire test on the train, where I didn't have access to a damage calculator or a weight list or whatever, I just knew the weights I happened to know by heart--so I then just assumed Garchomp and Cresselia were hit for 120 BP and my initial hypothesis was correct. Swampert made sense too because 4x weak, and Azumarill and Vaporeon made sense too because "only 60 BP"--and Hurrrnadus did seem to use GK occasionally on heavier Water-types. However, I initially thought it was like "BP over 100=vastly prefers GK, BP below 100=AI's brain works properly," and that was way off.
I still think there is some link to the move's Base Power because it does often end up using it when it's not its strongest move, but I feel that's a really easy answer lol, like of course it would use GK more often if it hits for a higher BP.
Another thing I figured, based on Garchomp's and Cresselia's data, was that "on all neutral hits and with a Base Power of 80 on GK, it's pretty much 50/50 between GK and Hurricane." So then I tested Deoxys-D last minute, but that one ended up refuting that pretty convincingly.
If anyone could see some patters here, that would be appreciated, because I'm frankly stumped and don't want to dismiss them entirely as "stupid" x___x sorry this was all over the place lol. also feel free to bring up some mons that would make sense testing (I pretty much just tested a bunch of things I happened to have battle ready, and I would have liked to test something like Camerupt but I just don't have a good Camerupt yet :p) or that would warrant some additional testing (because I'm aware ten battles per mon is a, uhm, questionable sample size lol)
also stay tuned for further context of this battle etc.
The AI is not making a lot of sense. What's the difference between Cresselia, Deoxys-D, and Garchomp that makes the AI willing to use Grass Knot on two of them but not Deoxys-D even though its base power is identical?
Only thing I can think of are the Pokémon's actual weights (that result in the same base power for GK): 95 kg for Garchomp, 85.6 kg for Cresselia, and 60.8 for Deoxys-D. If the AI were inspecting these instead of looking up GK's actual base power, maybe that could explain it - then the rule would be something like "for Pokémon heavier than 80kg (or w/e), the AI mysteriously may prefer Grass Knot over Hurricane", which sounds completely implausible.
Palkia and Gyarados also seem suspicious, why would the AI be that much more GK-happy on Gyarados when its base power is equal and Gyarados's weight is lower?
Gastrodon only getting GK'd 7 times out of 10 also looks odd given 240BP is still a heck of a lot more than 165BP - but its weight is 29.9kg which might be scaring the AI off somehow.
Hypno: 75.6 kg
Cofagrigus: 76.5 kg
Eelektross: 80.5 kg
Landorus: 68 kg
Deoxys-D, which was 60.8 kg, did not receive any Grass Knots, which is the treatment the three lighter ones got. Eelektross, just half a kilogram above 80, got a significant amount of 80BP Grass Knot over 120BP Focus Blast; though it resists Hurricane and the power difference is not as big as with Cresselia (85.6kg), so the results may not be directly comparable.
The weight theory doesn't fit with some of Plumberjack's tests, though: Palkia is much heavier than Gyarados, but received a lot less Grass Knot.
After grinding the XY battle maison multis with the braindead AI, I managed to end a streak with my own mistake (not clicking protect enough, rather than chomp fucking trying to outrage fairies), but more importantly, I ended it with a 60 win streak! Here's the video of the battle i lost: ZUNG-WWWW-WW2U-AR5H
This team's only real weakness is any crobat, sometimes I slip up and screw up against power herb-sky attack unfezant and hawlucha, but that's just me and not the team. Outrage rng also kind of screws me up, but honestly the ai is so random that outrage rng has minimal impact.
I didn't megavolve 90% of the time, since I exclusively used garde for telepathy because the ai's chomp loves to do nothing more than kill your lead. It turns out that it doesn't register air balloons, and it won't use earthquake if your pokemon's typing has one type that is weak to eq and it's not flying type (so, for example, it will always choose outrage if you have crustle, which is neutral, but the ai only sees rock type.) I have to have a neutrality, and maybe make my team's rock/ice weakness slightly less awful, so I settled on normal garde. normal garde is super slow, so I have to use timid if i don't want to gouge my eyes out. once the ai's chomp is finally dead, i can megavolve and hit slightly harder and go slightly faster, which is why i had gleam instead of hyper voice. protect is there for weird things that i don't account for. i don't take this seriously to control-f every pokemon i encounter on that huge document, and it helps against the aforementioned hawlucha and unfezant
I've used U-turn once or twice. I think I've used Steel Wing against a last poke Aurorus once. I think I've used Flare Blitz like 10 times to kill last-pokeon Steelix or last-pokemon Ferrothorn/Forretress. This thing spams Brave Bird and destroys Trick Room teams, it also destroys almost everything else. If I could have two of these instead of a garde and talonflame, I would do it in a heartbeat. Oh well.
Satan. I hate this thing but it's the only way I could ever beat the Maison. It uses Earthquake whenever it does damage to one thing and sometimes even when it doesn't (It doesn't recognize either balloons or Levitate and will gladly keep EQ'ing about until it dies, no switching ever) It uses Outrage whenever there are 2 flyings, or sometimes if there's one flying that it really cares about? Sometimes it uses Outrage if EQ is better. It uses Fire Fang on Scizor, Forretress, Skarmory, and Ferrothorn. It never uses Crunch. Ever.
I'm fully convinced this spams random moves until something does fair damage. It can't kill my own Pokemon, so it can do its own thing. It's the weakest link, but you don't need a perf team to beat the Chatelaines.
I did Multis before Triples for some reason. I hope it'll be easier than Multis, then I can finally get all the trophies without having friends/another system.
ORAS Rotations update: 1234 ongoing wins. I've expanded the post here.
Aside from being a nice number, the streak now doubles my previous record of 610. I also hit my goal of 10000 total across four modes, with 10551 total right now (6840 + 1467 + 1234 + 1010) after missing it with the loss in Doubles.
Mega Kangaskhan beats Suicune pretty handily. When the AI sends out a musketeer, go to Aegislash on what is almost certainly a Fighting-type attack (or it's Terrakion's Swords Dance, in which case you have to sac Aegislash to bring in Garchomp to KO). Aegislash should beat every Cobalion and Virizion set easily (though you'll want to have Swords Dance over Shadow Ball, or the Metal Burst set can KO you when you try to attack with Sacred Sword), and it should be able to survive a Terrakion EQ and KO with a +2 Sacred Sword.
So you're aware, the team you posted is pretty weak to burn. You got up to 234 with them, which is pretty good for a team that has severe vulnerabilities if you want to get long streaks (e.g. bad against burn, nothing blocks Walrein4 and Articuno2's OHKO moves) and isn't at all optimized for the Battle Maison. For longer streaks, you'll definitely need something with Substitute and something to absorb burn. Weakness Policy Aegislash is the type of Pokemon who's designed to KO one or two things and then go down, which is good for shorter streaks, but struggles in longer streaks because your team is viable to face the one threat you relied on Aegislash to handle after Aegislash has already been KO'd.
Aegislash @ Rocky Helmet
Ability: Stance Change
EVs: 252 HP / 96 Def / 160 SpD
Sassy Nature
- King's Shield
- Swords Dance
- Iron Head
- Sacred Sword
Greninja is my main little thing, and I will not switch it for anything else until I get to 100 straight wins with it. Being Choice'd isn't really a hindrance in this case because I can U-Turn out and it'll do a good amount of damage to most neutral things. I figure that Waterfall is kind of unnecessary here as I can use Rock Slide on fire, Ice Punch on ground and Garchomp can deal with Rock types very well, but I don't know what else to teach him, maybe Night Slash.
Garchomp is very good. Very. Good. It's the Singles King after all. I use Substitute to allow myself to setup and dodge status. Also perfect partner for Greninja, Garchomp can switch in on Electric if I'm still Water type, on Fires and Rocks if I'm Ice type. Iron Head let's me switch in if a Fairy kills Greninja and I think Gengar isn't a good option. I've had some problems with Outrage in the Maison. Considering switching this for a Special Landorus, but I'm not sure.
Mega Gengar represents my desire to use unused mons. It also compliments the team really well, I can switch it in on a Self-Destruct/Explosion, Fighting, Fairy, Grass and Ground attacks directed at Greninja. I chose Will-O-Wisp to survive a Sucker Punch from some things like Absol and hit them with something instead of being OHKO'd, or just spam it til the burn damage kills them.
Mega Alakazam used to take the place of Mega Gengar but I figured it didn't provide enough coverage. Also, despite having slightly higher Speed and SpAtk, it didn't provide as much power cuz only Psychic STAB and it isn't a great offensive type.
Togekiss and Aegislash used to be in the place that now belongs to Garchomp. First Togekiss, eats status for days and sets up a nice Nasty Plot, nice coverage against Grass, Fighting and Steel types and the flinch Air Slash is just too OP. Aegislash is a huge defensive powerhouse. Don't ask me about the set, I don't know why I got these EVs and I don't know why it had these moves, I forgot.
Thing is I don't really check out the sets list and what-not. I don't think it's fun and I usually do these at school, so no access to those anyway. Also, as I'm in school, I can't just pay full attention to it or the teachers will notice something weird, so my losses are always caused by not seeing the previous move or just making a bad bad decision. Haven't lost to hax yet.
I got to 58 wins in Super Singles and lost the 59th to a Carracosta.
I don't remember the start of the battle cuz it wasn't really remarkable. All I know is Greninja was OHKO'd and I lost Gengar to a Sucker Punch.
Now this Carracosta had Blizzard and I only had a Garchomp left, and I am pretty sure it was an OHKO. Knowing that Carracosta has huge Defense, I did what I always do when I see Blizzard. Spam Substitute. Wait for a miss. That miss never came. It used 5 or 6 straight Blizzards and not once it missed.
I don't have the habit of saving battles so idk, I prob could have avoided the loss.
Does anyone have any suggestion to complement the physical Greninja? I think I just have to pay more attention to the battles and then I'll be fine and get a good streak going, the team seem pretty solid to me. I also lost a battle cuz I used Will-O-Wisp for no reason at all and what could have been a 2HKO turned into me getting 2HKO'd. So decision making is something I've to improve too haha.
So about a month ago I got to 84 wins in Super Singles (AS). I do not have the Battle Video of my loss, because I did not expect to post the record anywhere in the future. However I figured I would post here anyway and let you guys decide if my evidence is good enough.
(That's the best I could do. Let me know if any other type of evidence is required)
Anyway, here is the team I used. It's nothing new, and is based on the popular Water + Dragon + Steel combo, however it managed to reach the 50+ wins I was going for.
Greninja can deal a massive amount of damage to just about anything my opponent decides to lead with. Its moveset has great neutral and super effective coverage, and the Protean plus Life Orb combo boosts its damage output to incredible heights.
Multiscale allows Dragonite to set up at least one Dragon Dance (most of the time), which boosts Dragonite's already insane attack stat. Outrage's base power combined with STAB allows Dragonite to OHKO or 2HKO most non-resistant Pokémon.
I used mega Kangaskhan for the first 20 battles or so, however he often had trouble knocking out some dangerous threats (which might be because I don't know how to use mega Kang properly, lol), so I decided to give mega Scizor a shot. I gave him a Careful nature and max HP and SpD, and it worked like a charm. He can take hits, at the same time as Swords Dance allows him to return the damage.
I can't remember exactly how I lost, though I think "Quick Claw" and "Rock Slide hax" were important keywords.
It's a bit remarkable how close in time my greatest achievements in this thread are—allthreeof them took place in March, and I haven't achieved anything all that groundbreaking since. April was even kinda ominous, because my 1000+ streaks ended at 1420 and 1028, respectively, both lost within like three days. I was somewhat unconcerned by losing in doubles—while it obviously still sucked, reaching 1000 was so amazing in and of itself that I really didn't have that much else to achieve there. Losing in triples was nothing short of awful, though, as 2000 was my goal and the team had the potential (judging by the extremely low number of close calls). But yeah, after that loss, I did what any sane human being would have done after being left devastated after playing over 3500 battles in under two months: I did... something else. Anything else, as long as it wasn't playing Battle Maison or actively playing Pokemon in general. When I returned not even that long after, I (hopefully understandably) wasn't yet up for another run in triples—fortunately, I had a couple other things left on my immediate Maison bucket list. There was Weavile / Mega Gardevoir in doubles, which hadn't reached anywhere near their potential on the 283 streak I posted before hitting 1000 in triples. And there was also a regret....
....why oh why didn't I just sack Scizor against that fiery butterfly that OHKOes it multiple times over instead of anticipating that 0,1% chance it would use QD? It was any fanboy's dream to see a 1000+ singles streak with lead Greninja, and I blew it, along with my chances of getting a triple 1k within a single month I guess lol. Moreover, it was only my first run with the team, I had improved as a player in general afterwards, and I had figured out more efficient ways to play in several matchups—so it would stand to reason I'd give it another go, right? And if I had gotten better at playing the team, getting to 1000 wouldn't be unrealistic, right?
So I whipped out Rael, Harlequin, and Little Nicky once again and embarked on a new adventure. A first run was lost to a classic bit of retardedness from the pre-battle 40 sets, but the second run got going nicely. I played well, I was indeed playing even more efficiently than on the first run, and I didn't save any battle videos as I went along because "omg who cares about those at this point", but I promised myself I would save #500 because 500 streaks in singles are cool, even if it's been done with the same team already.
So battle #500 arrived, the opponent was some Punk Girl, and the lead was Drapion. And I was overjoyed because not that long before I had figured out that I could PP stall it and have Scizor set up on it instead of 2HKOing it with Greninja's Surf while taking a ton of damage in the process—so that's what I did. Gliscor took some damage from taking a +6 Cross Poison because I miscounted and apparently it occasionally prefers using that against Scizor instead of setting up Swords Dances beyond +6 Attack, but Scizor's +6 Bullet Punch knocked Drapion's socks off. Out came... Ninetales. Drought Ninetales, even. With its HP investment, it's one of the rather few Fire-types that have a chance to survive Scizor's BP...
+6 252+ Atk Technician Mega Scizor Bullet Punch vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Ninetales: 157-186 (87.2 - 103.3%) -- 25% chance to OHKO
...but since I can't switch a weakened Gliscor in on this and sun + Passho Berry prevent Greninja from easily disposing of it, it's objectively the best play to just click BP and cross your fingers. So I click BP and cross my fingers, and as is to be expected Ninetales survives by the skin of its teeth and OHKOes Scizor two times over. No big deal, I send out Greninja and finish it off. Out comes....
Weavile.
Weavile in sun.
Like, there's a lot that Punk Guys / Girls can bring that loses to the combination of Greninja and Gliscor. But "Weavile in sun" is far and away the worst possible last mon they could have brought... Obviously it would have been a better play to stall out sun with Gliscor and finishing Ninetales off with Greninja was careless play, and heads up the Weavile matchup is still winnable because it likes to use Taunt and Fake Out first... but needless to say, I still lost.
A streak of 499 wins. I was pissed, lol. So I tried again, and I got a glorious winning streak of 1—apparently Milotic1 and a bit of RNG and some reckless plays were too much for my team. A new run ended in the early 50s, as did the next one. I think it was also around then that the 600-something streak with Weavile / Mega Gardevoir happened—I'm honestly not entirely sure which streak happened before, but I vaguely recall thinking "I'm sure as hell not gonna lose at 500 again," so I guess that one happened later. But anyways, singles was obviously stagnating... it got to the point that I was actually relieved the next time I managed to get past 100. I got past 200 on that run too, so it was starting to look nice. I whipped out my 3DS on the train to continue my run a bit on my way to school—I was at 215 then, and battle 216 went something like this:
- lead Rhyperior, Grass Knot KO;
- second mon Hydreigon, Ice Beam KO;
- third mon Gyarados... click Grass Knot, Gyarados uses DD;
- Grass Knot again, Gyarados uses DD;
- Gyarados uses Rest, Grass Knot again;
- Gyarados KOes Greninja with Aqua Tail;
- Gyarados 2HKOes Scizor while Bug Bite + Bullet Punch doesn't KO;
- Gyarados KOes Gliscor with Aqua Tail.
...alright, what just happened. My archnemesis rearing its ugly head and playing the battle perfectly—not a thing I could have done. "Spam GK" tends to work in the lead position because then it boosts one step further, allowing it to be brought in BP's KO range, which didn't happen here. This calc I ran later was especially saddening: +2 0 Atk Gyarados Aqua Tail vs. 0 HP / 4 Def Greninja: 84-99 (57.1 - 67.3%) -- guaranteed 2HKO
(84, 84, 85, 87, 87, 88, 90, 90, 91, 93, 93, 94, 96, 96, 97, 99)
Uninvested lv. 50 Greninja has 147 HP. It took two rounds of LO recoil while KOing Rhyperior and Hydreigon and took three more while spamming GK against Gyarados. One round of LO recoil takes away 14 HP, so Greninja had 77 HP remaining at this point and therefore was in Gyarados's +2 Aqua Tail KO range, which it'll use right after Rest—not before, because then the KO isn't secure yet. Two very costly prior rounds of Life Orb recoil here. Meaning...
I'll always lose if a third poke Gyarados comes out after Greninja KOes the first two Pokemon.
Alright, there are a couple ifs and buts here—Gyarados does screw up occasionally (and needs to do so only once for me to win), it might attack before using Rest because Greninja is KOed by a high damage roll then, it might continue boosting against Scizor, Aqua Tail might miss, other hax might go in my favour, like on that very run I had won twice in the same situation by critting a thirdmon Gyarados—but everything is completely out of my control at this point, and I don't like that. There's a reason I'm running a Gliscor team, heh. In the mean time, this made for yet another loss on the very first close call on a streak, around the same time when the same thing happened in rotations on another failed attempt to beat my X record with Team Crit Me Please, as well as a dumb loss in triples in the early 500s where Jolteon3 apparently preferred Swaggering both Greninja and Azumarill over attacking them and every coinflip involved that could go wrong also did go wrong, including Glaceon's Quick Claw triggering and the subsequent Blizzard landing a double crit, so yeah. Like, between losing my 1420 triples streak (or technically even earlier, I guess) and even way after this happening, I legit don't recall winning /any/ close calls outside of the 600-something doubles run, it was that bad.
I wasn't really planning on giving up on the Greninja team, like "don't let it happen—just don't" is an approach worth trying, and Gliscor can take down a Rhyperior too, we can overload it just a tad more...
...I just got tired. So very, very tired. It was also around then that I realised that GP work is actually way more fun than actually playing the game (an opinion that I stand by to this day—and I would sooner see myself stop playing than stop checking), so most of my Maison time drowned in the GP rampage I went on around then. I regret nothing :3
It was (I think) half June around then, and my Maison involvement became basically limited to theorycrafting another one of those teams that I probably wouldn't end up using anyways because it would suck—or would it? The problem with Greninja / Mega Scizor / Gliscor was basically how it had been optimised completely yet still was countered by a specific threat. Because improvement didn't seem possible, I took a deconstructionist approach and yanked out Scizor and replaced it with that other Steel-type Swords Dance user—Aegislash. Greninja / Aegislash / Gliscor is a pretty legit team, and it even briefly crossed Jumpman's mind a couple times in the musings that eventually led to the genesis of Kangliscune, but nevertheless, for my team that doesn't really solve anything; heck, it actually makes the team only more vulnerable to Gyarados and is pretty much objectively inferior to the Scizor lineup. Still, it did break the deadlock. Contemplating this setup, I got all giddy from the sheer number of Pokemon the Aegislash / Gliscor combination would wall the ever-loving hell out of... but they still have problems of course. That specific combo, although in theory it could be like the most potent pivoting duo the Maison has ever seen, hasn't been explored in too much detail as far as I'm aware, only achieving a notable streak in VaporeonIce's (not posted itt) 523-win streak with Dragonite / Aegislash / Gliscor, which cannot be optimal for the double 4x Ice weakness alone (and therefore that number is really hella impressive!)—Aegislash and Gliscor have issues with Pokemon with Ice + Ghost / Dark coverage, specifically Froslass, Glaceon, and Greninja; while Glaceon isn't too much of a problem because it's possible to switch in Gliscor on a Shadow Ball by pivoting via Aegislash, the faster Froslass and Greninja must be covered somewhat reliably by the third team member. Greninja does that by virtue of typing alone, but it's not a good enough fit otherwise—however, this still gives us something to work with. It's actually really funny how Aegislash and Gliscor's typing synergy isn't /that/ terrific (there are four types they don't resist) and Water / Dark complements them perfectly; Greninja notably had the benefit of covering Fire-types, the type the Aegislash / Gliscor combo would have most trouble with. Another string of thought of mine was typing related too, this time more specifically to Aegislash's: one of the more notable downsides of its typing compared to Scizor's is the Earthquake weakness. However, that one can be taken advantage of by switching to a Ground-immune teammate and then switching back to Aegislash on a resisted attack, right? That's obviously a thing that has been done to death, usually with Dragonite, but obviously any other Rock-weak Flying-type would work here too in theory. I don't even recall if pairing it up with Intimidate was something I actively thought up att, but I think it just so happened. Oh, and it would be nice if the third team member would beat Gyarados4 too, wouldn't it?
I don't even know why I'm still talking at this point—to me, it clicked even way before I rounded out the above thought process, and I'm sure y'all have also realised by now what Pokemon I'm talking about. I'm glad I didn't have to pull a stunt like buying a new game and learning a new generation of RNG abuse to get the Pokemon I needed (like I had to do with Thundurus-T for doubles) this time, because the Pokemon I was looking for, albeit with a wrong EV spread because I had been looking to use it in doubles instead, had been sitting cosy in my box for months already.
I'll limit myself to saying that it still feels really ironic how it was lead Greninja's archnemesis who managed to succeed where lead Greninja failed. For my 1000th post, I'm posting my third 1000+ streak in different formats in the Battle Maison. Posting an ongoing streak of 1024 wins in ORAS Super Singles.
687: PCXW-WWWW-WW2U-LX25
The Hurrrrnadus battle vid that prompted the Grass Knot a couple days earlier. Excuse me for Mega Evolving turn 2, that was totally unnecessary T__T
822: JBAG-WWWW-WW2U-LWL3
Battle against a Curse lead, the kind that prompted the stat boosting post a couple months back. Also showcases Intimidate switch-stalling I guess.
857: C9JG-WWWW-WW2U-LWMM
PP stalling a lead Crobat4 almost completely dry and a great example of switch-stalling between Aegislash and Gliscor to help Gyarados set up; watch at your own risk.
885: KTEG-WWWW-WW2R-WEVS
A near-loss against lead Drizzle Politoed4, discussed in more detail later.
1000: SBUG-WWWW-WW2S-2DCB
Proof of reaching 1000, and a nice example of Gliscor stalling to help Gyarados set up.
The Dragon Dancer and Intimidate lead that complemented the Aegislash / Gliscor pairing pretty much perfectly; (thanks tennisace for that Lure Ball Magikarp spitback back in January lol) its two different defensive typings allow it to click into this team in a number of ways no other Pokemon would have been capable of, and Intimidate allows it to neuter pretty much any physical attacker carrying Earthquake by switch-stalling with Aegislash. Mold Breaker is honestly a really sweet ability for sweeping purposes too, but Intimidate is so stupidly good (and this team relies on it so much x__x) that you'll want to keep Gyarados unevolved for as long as possible. The moveset is honestly really straightforward, and it's thanks to ORAS that this team became possible. Dragon Dance is the obligatory boosting move, and Substitute is stupidly mandatory too, with Mega Gyarados's inability to hold Lum Berry and this team's lack of a burn absorber, but especially to prevent Mega Gyarados from being screwed over (as much) by a crit from a -6 physical attacker, to prevent it from being haxed by Flare Blitz or Blizzard, and to allow it to completely poop on passive foes. There's nothing that screams "it just wins" like clicking Sub against lead Weezing4. I carefully considered what pair of attacking moves would provide the best coverage, and I settled simply on its STAB moves, deciding against Earthquake and Return. I think it's only resisted by (ironically) Torrent Greninja, Shiftry, Breloom, Virizion, Hydreigon, and Poliwrath, all of which are easily handled by Aegislash / Gliscor or, in Greninja's case, set up on by Gyarados regardless—however, in the end I would have picked them regardless of coverage, because Waterfall is mandatory to take care of Fire-types (Volcarona lol) and Crunch is mandatory to take on Starmie.
I recall mentioning at some point that I'm garbage with complex defensive EV spreads—that point still holds true, so I'm glad turskain lent me a hand with this one :) The spread focuses on Gyarados's offensive capabilities, because it's pretty weak as is and focusing on defense didn't really seem to do anything (like, Greninja fails to break Mega Gyarados's Sub regardless of investment, Starmie requires an absolutely outrageous amount of Special Defense to avoid the 2HKO, etc.)—the current spread uses Garchomp4 as a bulk target, allowing Mega Gyarados to set up one DD on it and 2HKO it, provided there are no critical hits. With 36 Defense EVs, a max roll +1 Earthquake inflicts 136 HP damage, and 84 HP puts Gyarados at 181 HP and accordingly makes one round of Rough Skin damage inflict 22 HP. 22 + 136 + 22 = 180. Boom.
Initially, the spread ran 228 Atk and 156 Spe to keep ahead of Volcarona4 after an equal number of boosts and always OHKO Mismagius4 with unboosted Crunch—however, two more points in Speed were required to outrun Starmie at +1, so those points were taken away from Attack, leaving a 7/8 chance to OHKO Mismagius, which was "fine." That's not to say you should set up on Starmie because paralysis happens, but being able to blow through it after being only allowed to net one boost (which is no rare occurrence) is obviously pretty valuable. And I later figured out I could just neuter Mismagius in the same way as Lapras by switching to Aegislash, keeping it in until the last turn of Perish Song, and switching back to Gyarados to reset the battle (which all things considered is generally safer than giving up Intimidate right away and not boosting), so there was honestly no need to go for the unboosted OHKO after all. Focusing on Attack turned out to be the right decision in the end because 212 EVs are just enough for Mega Gyarados to OHKO (Infiltrator) Chandelure4 without boosting.
Naegling (Aegislash) @ Leftovers
Ability: Stance Change
Nature: Brave
IVs: 31/31/31/8/31/29
EVs: 252 HP / 252 Atk / 4 SpD
Stats: 71 Spe
- Swords Dance
- King's Shield
- Shadow Sneak
- Iron Head
So the first Pokemon to be used on three different (legit) 1000+ teams effectively plays as a glorified punching bag, eh? This is actually the third Aegislash I used on this run—when I had just thought up this team and felt like trying things out, I tossed on my special doubles Aegislash (with Shadow Sneak over Wide Guard), and I actually got to like over 100 before I decided to stop being lazy and train up my StanceDance Aegislash; the team's defensive synergy was simply that good. I know turskain argued for a 79 Speed Aegislash, but judging by the Speed tiers, that was not what I was looking for, because Aegislash was my go-to counter to Scrafty, which 79 Speed Aegislash actually loses to. I was still a lil bit lazy, so I continued playing with a 58 Speed (Brave 0 IV) Aegislash (standard set), with the full intention to figure out a more appropriate benchmark "later." And "later," I did indeed. turskain's original Aegislash Speed tier summary is as follows (press alt twice to be able to expand):
First, it should be noted that, for example, a healthy Aegislash still beats Aurorus handily, even if it's slower. It's just less secure. But anyways, as stated, I need Aegislash to beat Scrafty, so 79 Speed wasn't an option. When determining a minimum, I figured getting paralysed by Regice4 and risking paralysis from Regice12, which sit at 70 Speed, wasn't acceptable—therefore, even though there were a couple slower mons I would have liked Aegislash to be able to beat, 71 Speed was the bare minimum, and my options were the empty tiers between 71 and 79, i.e. 71 Speed, 73 Speed, and 77 Speed (the two mons in that tier don't exist beyond battle 40). Curiously, out of all relevant mons in that area, I wouldn't rely on Aegislash to handle any of them in the first place; most of them are much better suited for Gliscor, Gyarados, or both to take on. When looking into more corner-case scenarios, though, two foes jump out. Firstly, there's Vaporeon1, which, albeit rare, would be nice to take out without having to eat a Shadow Ball first, as Gliscor can't reliably stall it because of its Quick Claw; secondly, there's Tyranitar4, which I usually humiliate with Gliscor but would become legit dangerous if I were to lose Gliscor for whatever reason because of Sash + Earthquake + Rock Slide. Vaporeon1 would require 77 Speed to outrun, while Tyranitar4 would require 71 Speed to underspeed; and since Vaporeon1 is mostly irrelevant and Tyranitar4 isn't, I went with 71 Speed. Admittedly, it's kind of a corner-case scenario that brought me to this decision, so I guess 73 and 77 would work fine as well if nothing really dumb happens... heck, I think even 79 Speed is workable if you try to get cute around Scrafty and try switch-stalling it out of a bunch of PP first and then having Gliscor remove its remaining PP and Gyarados set up on it. A lot less reliable than having Aegislash handle it, but most likely doable...
It was on the fourth and final run that I finished training my 71 Speed Aegislash—but the team did have reliability issues with a couple leads and had had those for a long time. Yanmega and Togekiss were totally retarded to face, defeating Gyarados without too much trouble, 4x resisting Sacred Sword and not being anywhere near KOed by a +2 Sneak, and heavily pressuring Gliscor by sheer damage output and, in Yanmega's case, the hax factor. Noivern was another very scary one to face, and another one with a resistance to Sacred Sword. Lastly, there was (Taunt + Rain Dance + Hurricane) Tornadus4, which I could barely even "play around." There was a fix available. A very easy fix, and I had known that for hundreds of battles at that point already. Would I go there?
Yes, Iron Head. That third good physical move Aegislash has access to but doesn't fit on standard Maison singles Aegislash because "muh perfect neutral coverage." "Perfect neutral coverage" is just that, however, neutral, and the fact that a neutral Iron Head is considerably stronger than a neutral Sacred Sword sorta invalidates that. Obviously Sacred Sword does inflict neutral damage on more targets than Iron Head—but Yanmega, Togekiss, Noivern, and Tornadus are not among those.
Sacred Sword's advantages over Iron Head for this team are... very few and far between. It matters very little for faster threats, because in practice a Sacred Sword OHKO isn't more desirable than an Iron Head + Shadow Sneak 2HKO—on the contrary even, because the latter option gives three rounds of Leftovers recovery as opposed to one, heh. And Electric-types are pooped on by Gliscor, and you wouldn't want to keep in Aegislash against Fire-types in the first place.
It ignores evasion boosts—but Gliscor poops on pretty much every evasion user as is. It ignores defensive boosts—but every single Curse user is either PP stalled via Intimidate switching or PP stalled via Gliscor's Sub / Protect anyway, and setting up Gyarados is way more desirable than setting up Aegislash. The only defensive booster I would KO with Sacred Sword and cannot be beaten with Iron Head was Lanturn4—but that one can also be switch-stalled out of Charge Beam PP, which allows me to set up Gyarados on it, which I should have been doing in the first place already, and which also taught me that I can stall (Pressure) Zapdos2 out of Charge Beam PP and set up on it with Gyarados.
And Scrafty, like, that thing I even used a 71 Speed Aegislash for in the first place? I beat it in ten out of ten mock battles—obviously having to rely on Iron Head here is a tad more stressful, but Aegislash boosts faster and Scrafty can't keep up, and if you're not getting too cute with failed King's Shields, it still beats it with ease. Even if does manage to have its Defense boosts go out of control via smart Protect usage, there's a backup plan available:
+4 0 Atk Scrafty Payback (50 BP) vs. 212 HP / 36 Def Gliscor on a critical hit: 94-112 (53.1 - 63.2%) -- 84.8% chance to 2HKO after Poison Heal
...lol. You'd have to do something really dumb in order not to get Gliscor in safely, and plenty easy to just stall out its remaining Payback PP then.
Yeah. There was hardly any reason to keep Sacred Sword—the only potential one I recall is Skarmory4 (against which Sacred Sword is hardly the second coming of Jesus), but that one doesn't outweigh the peace of mind against all those other threats. I made the switch around 225 in my current streak, and I never looked back. Obviously Sacred Sword is still better in a vacuum—it's just not what this team needs.
Don't mess with perfection—this is the exact same Gliscor that carried Greninja / Scizor / Gliscor on its back to that 810 record. The EV spread is essentially a max / max SpD spread, with 212 HP providing pretty much the highest Poison Heal number. Of the remaining 44 EVs, 4 go in Speed to put Gliscor at the only empty tier within its reach, 36 go in Defense for added physical bulk, and 4 go in Attack because they wouldn't do anything in Defense. Like with Greninja / Scizor / Gliscor, I opted for a Careful Gliscor over a Jolly one in order to better handle Vaporeon4 and counter all Latios sets, but I guess a slightly stronger case could be made for a Jolly one here? It would at least allow me to handle Charizard4 a lot more easily, which is simply stupid to face (not that it's any more pleasant with the Greninja team lol), and Gliscor has less weight to carry on this team (I used the Greninja team for the first 180 battles of this attempt because it's faster and for a trip down memory lane, and the pressure placed on Gliscor is downright stupid lol), but yeah... I know what a Careful Gliscor does and I know it can do a bunch of things that my team needs but Jolly can't do, not to mention the lower Speed and consequent ability to maintain a Sub more easily against faster foes does make it better against the average Pokemon.
The team's primary game plan is to fully set up Gyarados behind a Sub. This can be enabled in a number of ways; Gyarados and Aegislash can drop an Earthquake-using physical attacker's Attack all the way down to -6 via Intimidate switches, Gliscor can use Substitute + Protect to stall the PP of a threatening move, these two tactics can be used in combination with each other (e.g. against Flygon4, against which the plan is to stall out its EdgeQuake PP via Intimidate switches + King's Shield and its Outrage PP via Substitute + Protect, allowing Mega Gyarados to set up on -6 Crunch), or Gyarados can just take advantage of Substitute itself to set up on passive foes or Overheat users.
If this isn't possible, not fully setting up Gyarados (+4 is generally plenty too, and usually even +2 with a Sub is enough to win a game; occasionally you'll also have to boost just once, mainly against Fire-types like Arcanine and Volcarona), fully setting up Aegislash, or setting up Gliscor is fine too, in no particular order of preference, and there are some corner-case scenarios where you have to go for an immediate OHKO with Gyarados or a +2 Sneak
As a rule of thumb, though, try to hold off on Mega Evolving Gyarados unless it's absolutely required, in order to preserve Intimidate, and don't be afraid to switch out a fully set up Aegislash if you can set up Gyarados instead—there's plenty of stuff that beats a +6 Aegislash, but a +6 Gyarados behind a Sub is nigh invincible except in dumb scenarios like second mon Static + third mon Sash I guess.
Since this is honestly pretty standard Maison fare, here's a sample of my list of "how to play against lead X" to get a better impression of what ths team can do, apologies in advance if it's hard to make sense of lol.
Venusaur4: switch to Gliscor and stall Sludge Bomb; then, make sure you have up a Sub to discourage it from using Leech Seed, go back to Gyarados, and set up a Sub and six Dragon Dances; alternatively, switch-stall Sludge Bomb and Leech Seed between Aegislash and Gliscor, and then go back to Gyarados.
Raichu4: go to Gliscor, straight Toxic; it can't touch you but will use Encore, so yeah. After three turns, switch back and forth to Aegislash, and set up a free Sub on the turn Raichu succumbs to Toxic damage.
Nidoqueen4: drop its Attack via Intimidate switches; go to Gliscor on its ninth Earthquake; stall Poison Jab; pivot back to Gyarados via Aegislash; don't Mega Evolve, set up a Sub, and boost to +6.
Poliwrath4: go to Aegislash on Waterfall/FP/CT, go to Gliscor on EQ, Sub / Protect stall Waterfall, switch stall Earthquake PP between Aegislash and Gliscor, fully set up Aegislash.
Gengar4: go to Gliscor on Thunderbolt, Sub / Protect stall Shadow Ball, switch stall Sludge Bomb and most of Thunderbolt PP between Aegislash and Gliscor, wait out the last couple of Thunderbolt PP with Gliscor, go back to Gyarados after it wastes its final PP, and set up a Sub and two DDs as it Struggles to death.
Weezing4: set up a Sub, and freely boost to +6.
Starmie4: Mega Evolve + straight Crunch KO.
Mr. Mime4: go to Aegislash, SD once, Sneak KO.
Jynx4: Mega Evolve, go to Aegislash, wait out Blizzard PP, go back to Gyarados, and freely set up a Sub and six DDs.
Zapdos12: go to Gliscor, Toxic stall set 1 and set 2 if it has Static; if it's set 2 with Pressure, stall Heat Wave, switch + KS stall Charge Beam, and fully set up Gyarados.
Metagross4: go to Gliscor, stall Meteor Mash, fully set up Gyarados.
Latios12: go to Gliscor; if set 1, stall it out of its attacking PP and set up Gyarados; if set 2, try to bounce a couple Draco Meteors off Aegislash, and Toxic stall after getting rid of its Draco Meteor PP.
Gastrodon4: use Intimidate switches to drop its Attack all the way to -6 even while it sets up six Curses; then, set up a Sub and six DDs with Gyarados and like 5HKO it with (non-Mega) Crunch.
Mismagius4: go to Aegislash, do nothing, go back to Gyarados on the last turn of Perish Song to reset the battle.
Electivire4: go to Gliscor on Thunder Punch, Protect, go to Aegislash on Ice Punch, go to Gyarados on Earthquake. Repeat five times, switch-stall the remaining Earthquake and Ice Punch PP between Aegislash and Gliscor, possibly have Aegislash take a Fire Punch to unfreeze it if you're into that sort of thing, and then KO the -6 Electivire with Gliscor while making sure to come out on top with a Sub.
Excadrill4: switch stall Earthquake while dropping its Attack to -6 via Intimidate and speeding up the process with King's Shield; set up Aegislash as far as possible and finish it off right before it faints to Life Orb damage.
Seismitoad4: go to Aegislash, go back to Gyarados as it uses Dig, DD to waste a turn; rinse and repeat until its Attack is at -6, and set up a Sub and six DDs with non-Mega Gyarados, using the Speed advantage gained from using DD on its Dig turn to set up the Sub before potential Poison Touch shenanigans.
Carracosta4: switch-stall Rock Slide and Earthquake while dropping its Attack all the way down, Sub + Mega Evolve, set up six Dragon Dances.
Ferrothorn4: go to Gliscor, PP stall Gyro Ball, Rock Smash, and Curse; then, use Intimidate switches to drop its Attack back to 0, set up a Sub, and keep Dragon Dancing until it's Struggled to death.
Hydreigon4: go to Aegislash, KS, go to Gliscor, Protect, go to Aegislash, KS, go to Gliscor, Toxic stall.
Volcarona4: DD once, non-Mega Waterfall OHKO, don't try anything fancy.
Tornadus12: non-Mega DD once; set 1 will almost always use GK whereas set 2 is more unpredictable, but LO recoil gives away the set either way if its attack hits. If its attack hits and set 1 is confirmed, OHKO with non-Mega Waterfall after LO recoil. If set 2, go to Aegislash and spam King's Shield until either Hurricane PP is gone or Aegislash faints. Then, go to Gliscor, stall its remaining attacking PP, fully set up Gyarados, wait until it uses all its Sub PP, KO. If it uses Hurricane and misses, rinse and repeat.
759 | Absol4 | Jolly | BrightPowder | Substitute | Swagger | Punishment | Will-O-Wisp | Atk/Spd
910 | Moltres1 | Modest | White Herb | Overheat | Air Slash | Tailwind | Will-O-Wisp | Spd/SpA
Off the top of my head, the only two Wisp users faster than Gyarados... which makes them the most threatening status users too, with the combination of Aegislash and Gliscor giving negative shits about Toxic and Thunder Wave. It is with shame that I admit I legit cannot recall facing a single lead Absol4 on this run x__x but I think I'd handle it similarly to how I handle Infiltrator Spiritomb4. Obviously Gliscor should get in safely, which means Aegislash must take the burn, so switch to Aegislash, try KOing it on the spot, and if Aegislash gets burned, go to Gliscor, which then handles it easily.
I have faced several lead Moltres1 though (including three in ten battles when I was about to break my Greninja record, that was fun)... and it's just unpredictable as heck. It /usually/ uses Air Slash, but Tailwind and Wisp are possibilities too. As far as I can tell, the best thing to do against it is just go for the unboosted Mega Waterfall OHKO, which works if it uses Air Slash or Tailwind, heh. DD is obviously great if it uses Air Slash and surprisingly workable if it uses Wisp (because burned +1 Waterfall hits harder than burned +0 Waterfall) but kind of a downer if it uses Tailwind... and on this one, two out of three moves are likely to have you end up with a burned Gyarados as opposed to just one. If Gyarados falls, it's not too much of a problem for Gliscor to finish it off, though...
And did I mention that Flame Body is just stupid? I legit don't get that competitive players consider a terrible move that only provides you with a 25% chance to win back the turn lost to setting it up in the first place to be the next coming of Satan whereas a costless 30% chance to essentially shut down any physical attacker is apparently fine, but maybe that's just me. I still recall that one battle where lead Talonflame4's Flame Body triggered when I OHKOed it with Gyarados on sight (required because +1 Gale Wings Brave Bird kinda hurts) and the next mon was Garchomp4, lol—if it had boosted against Gyarados, a loss would have been the likely outcome.
758 | Skarmory4 | Careful | Lum Berry | Spikes | Stealth Rock | Whirlwind | Toxic | HP/SpD
Taunt > Substitute on Gyarados for this one case lol. A full physical team without any moves to hit this thing super effectively naturally struggles against it, and I think the best thing to do is just batter away at it with Gyarados and Aegislash until it faints and hope the backups can be beaten... Apart from Toxicking Gyarados, it doesn't cause /that/ much damage though x___x so thus far that has been the case, but yeah. No reliable counterplay for this one.
856 | Yanmega4 | Modest | Kings Rock | Bug Buzz | Air Slash | Detect | Shadow Ball | Spd/SpA
897 | Togekiss4 | Modest | Expert Belt | Aura Sphere | Air Slash | Heat Wave | Dazzling Gleam | Spd/SpA
169 | Noivern4 | Modest | Wide Lens | Dragon Pulse | Hurricane | Flamethrower | Focus Blast | Spd/SpA
Public enemies no.1-3 before adding Iron Head but more manageable now. Yanmega pretty much eats Gyarados alive, easily 3HKOing it with Air Slash or Tinted Lens Bug Buzz while Gyarados can't set up on it because Speed Boost /might/ allow Yanmega to remain ahead of it and its needs two DDs to even have a chance (albeit a near-guaranteed one) to OHKO it, while it has Shadow Ball to scare Aegislash and doesn't need much hax to luck its way through Gliscor. It also has Detect and King's Rock for additional trollage, so yeaahhhh. Iron Head provided a nice safe move to finish it off after a single Waterfall from Gyarados though, so wooo. (I'd usually end up hitting it once with Waterfall and then switching to Aegislash on what's usually a Detect and often "just" a resisted move). In practice, it's often possible too to have Aegislash set up to +6 by dancing around its Detects, but Iron Head just provided so very much peace of mind here... While Yanmega is usually considered Starmie light, it's much more threatening to this team, which can only barely 2HKO something with like the worst defensive typing around, lol.
Toge is just strong, preventing Gliscor from switching in on it reliably. I used to handle it sort of via straight Toxic + lots of Protect stalling, but now I can just go to Aegislash and OHKO it with Iron Head. An unboosted Aegislash obviously isn't the greatest setup, and it may burn (which happened literally the first time I faced it after adding IH lol), but whatever, this set is ridiculous T__T
Noivern is probably the most dangerous one of the three at this point, and I'm glad I pretty much never get to face it as a lead... The best option seems to be DD once + Crunch, but it's definitely no guaranteed OHKO (who ever said this thing is frail heh), but it's not too hard to overcome with Aegislash.
851 | Braviary4 | Adamant | Wacan Berry | Brave Bird | Tailwind | Superpower | Giga Impact | Atk/Spd
The other Defiant user, Bisharp, is easy as hell to KO with Gliscor from behind a Sub—Braviary is in another league. It outspeeds the entire team, cannot be OHKOed by +1 Gyarados, and causes serious trouble if it crits Aegislash. Aegislash 2HKOes it with Iron Head, and it will waste turns on using Tailwind and Giga Impact (which is why set 3 is even probably more threatening lol), but my matchup against this thing is sketchy at best. This is definitely the one threat where Carl's team of Gyarados / Ferrothorn / Gliscor works better than mine heh, can't really bait it into using Superpower with Aegislash.
860 | Starmie4 | Timid | Kings Rock | Surf | Psychic | Thunderbolt | Ice Beam | Spd/SpA
The literal only Electric-type move user that cannot be stalled (the only other one Gliscor cannot take on directly iirc is Electivire, which can be stalled out of Ice Punch by switch-stalling through the whole team)—therefore, Gyarados actually has to bite the bullet and eat a Thunderbolt here, unlike against similar threats like Gengar4. It doesn't even 2HKO without a crit (and a high roll on top of that) and Mega Gyarados obviously OHKOes with Crunch in return, but King's Rock flinches happen, Thunderbolt paralysis happens, and a damaged and unboosted Mega Gyara obviously isn't the greatest setup either. Starmie is a common source of hax and frustration, and while it needs a humongous amount of hax to actually run through my team, it only needs a little to punch a hole in it, which isn't too hard for it to snatch.
791 | Spiritomb4 | Careful | Custap Berry | Will-O-Wisp | Sucker Punch | Substitute | Pain Split | HP/SpD
A guaranteed +6 Gyarados behind a Sub if it has Pressure, a legit pain in the ass if it has Infiltrator. Gliscor still beats it handily, but it obviously must be poisoned in order to do so, so it can only switch in after Tomb has already burned my current active Pokemon—so that comes down to switching in Aegislash and going to Gliscor after it gets burned. In practice, Aegislash can often beat Tomb itself reasonably well (+2 / burned +6 Iron Head OHKOes), but I have to anticipate being effectively one Pokemon down if this thing shows up.
As for the other Infiltrator users, Noivern is very threatening too, but that's by virtue of its powerful special attacks anyway, with Infiltrator being just an added bonus. Chandelure4 is very conveniently just barely OHKOed by Mega Waterfall, so while it does force Gyarados to Mega Evolve, it isn't an instant crisis. And I actually legit forgot that Crobat got Infiltrator heh, so that's probably a testament as to how threatening it really is to this team... It can easily be stalled out of its attacking moves and Taunt, after which Gyarados can set up on it; if it's Infiltrator, you should notice it is while Sub / Protect stalling Cross Poison, allowing you to set up Aegislash instead.
That's Team Marathon, and this is Team Marathon's fourth run. The first run ended against 178 battles in a haxing spree of Hurrrnadus, when it actually used Hurricane on Gyarados (the only time I recall it doing so :p) and saw both Gyarados and Gliscor get confused and hit themselves immediately... yeah... I guess I could have played around it a tad better, but yeah. The second run wasn't that much better, ending at around 225 wins, but this time it was due to clear misplays. I faced a lead Barbaracle, and the strategy I used was to set up a Sub to absorb Stone Edge while Mega Evolving, then switch to Gliscor on the Cross Chop, and have Gliscor do... whatever it does. Gliscor did do whatever it does and beat Barbaracle—the next Pokemon was Swampert4. There I was, having given up one of my Ground immunities and Gliscor having only like 12 Sub / Protect PP remaining. Not the greatest setup against a Curse booster. I guess it was winnable by switch-stalling a bit initially and switch-stalling a lot afterwards, but I still lost. This loss had me wonder if the team was even viable at all—after all, this was hardly a convoluted scenario, with literally every Pokemon Ranger and Worker being able to run this combo. It was then that I realised I could have held off on Mega Evolving Gyarados by pivoting Gliscor in via Aegislash (a neutral Shadow Claw is hardly stronger than a resisted Cross Chop after all, urgh), which would also have allowed me to lower Barbaracle's Attack even further with King's Shield—and Swampert would have been beaten by PP stalling Curse via Intimidate switches :] first time I thought of that, and I've been using it quite liberally since, lol.
On a third run (on which I was at 375 when I posted Curse users not boosting past +6), I had the team mostly figured out, and it went well—until I derped massively against a lead Blaziken1 after 410, basically forgetting about its Will-O-Wisp and switching Gliscor headlong into it and forgetting about its bulk investment so Aegislash failed to finish it off with Shadow Sneak. Gyarados lucked out and sort of managed to beat it, but it didn't stand a chance against the follow-up Swampert3—and thus I had to embark on a fourth attempt to at least try and beat VaporeonIce's Draegiscor, because that was the bare minimum for posting.
Remember what I said about not winning any close calls whatsoever for months? I had won a couple close calls already on my previous runs, meaning "form" was returning, but this run I actually dragged away a couple wins from before the gates of hell like in the good old days, lol. There was a battle that I frankly should have lost (if the AI got above-average damage rolls when it mattered) because of my own stupidity, once again in the early 400s, once again against lead Blaziken1 T__T This time I did the "right" thing and left Aegislash in to get it burned, after which I beat it with Gliscor. Out came Venusaur2, relevant move being Roar, and instead of doing what I should have been doing and Intimidate stalling, I just hammered away at it until it died. Gyarados was the one that ended up finishing it off while still at relatively high health. Out came Charizard4, and I clicked Waterfall for the win—when I read "Gyarados flinched and couldn't move!" Then, things became ugly, with Aegislash being burned and weakened and Gliscor weakened too and being low on Sub / Protect PP—a mid damage roll from Heat Wave allowed Gliscor to Sub with 2 HP remaining, and a couple opportune misses from Charizard allowed it to get back to a slighly more secure level and to Toxic it, pulling through just barely. Lead Blaziken from a starter breeder is obviously a foe that this team really, really, really hates facing because of the threat of Will-O-Wisp or a faster Thunder Punch, and I recall VaporeonIce mentioning that Team Plaguarism would essentially auto-lose against it unless he got really lucky with boosts, so I'm not alone at struggling against this one :3
The other narrow escape was against a Pokemon that's one of the most classic examples for Gliscor PP stalling: Politoed4. With lead Greninja, I'd switch in Gliscor on Focus Blast, PP stall its attacking moves, and fully set up Scizor—with Gyarados, I'd do something similar by Mega Evolving + setting up a Sub to absorb the Pump / Blizzard and then switching to Gliscor on the baited Focus Blast and doing the exact same thing. This time, however, Politoed had Drizzle, broke the Sub with Hydro Pump, and used.... Hypnosis.... on the switch. It was a misplay on my part—it was my first time facing Drizzletoed, and Politoed's only non-FB attack that can break Mega Gyarados's Sub is rain-boosted Hydro Pump, meaning I always had a Sub up before when I switched to Gliscor. Obviously it wouldn't use Hypnosis then. I pulled through just barely because Politoed missed more attacks than it should have and a +1 Gyarados managed to sweep the backups. Within the good fortune, there was also bad fortune when the RNG rolled the wrong way on
+1 212+ Atk Mold Breaker Mega Gyarados Crunch vs. 0 HP / 0 Def Politoed: 159-187 (96.3 - 113.3%) -- 81.3% chance to OHKO—watch one of the craziest battles on this run via KTEG-WWWW-WW2R-WEVS
These were the only two "omg I should have lost this" battles on this run, however, as opposed to at least five on the Greninja run. As much as I hate to admit it, it looks like that team just punched way above its weight. This team is a lot more reliable, but I am more ambivalent towards it, because if you ever thought it looks similar to VaporeonIce's Mega Salamence team, that's because it is, lol. We thought up our teams independently (I had just embarked on my second run when he PMed me about his Salamence team requesting Mence and Chansey be added to the Maison guide), but since I really like being a little unique, it still annoys me that my team is effectively a directly outclassed version of a team higher on the leaderboards, lol—with MegaMence's access to recovery and Chansey's ability to wall pretty much every single special attacker, his team is the same concept done better. A small edge my team has over his is better PP stalling capabilities thanks to Gliscor, which helps against threats like Wailord4, and I GUESS Gyarados can sweep more easily with fewer boosts than Salamence because it runs dual STAB moves... but otherwise, if someone wants to run a team like this and doesn't have any particular feelings towards Gyarados or Gliscor, I'll have to tell them "just use VaporeonIce's," and that honestly bugs me a little. I guess I do deserve some cool points for using Gyarados and Iron Head Aegislash though...
...and more importantly, the team is fun. When your team's way around Gengar involves not "DD once + Crunch OHKO" but "PP stall it dry completely (using SubToxic Gliscor of all things as the counter) in order to snatch two boosts and a Sub as it struggles to death," you can be either annoyed that that is indeed the optimal play against that foe or giddy that it's even possible in the first place. I lean towards the latter :3 Whereas triples and doubles are incredibly fast paced and pretty much about efficiently overwhelming the opponent, singles are... different. Or in any case with the teams I like using, lol, with "so you think you're in control" Gliscor being the crutch of both of them. "Team Marathon" is a pretty appropriate name for multiple reasons—firstly, because this team can honestly be as fast as peanut butter in a garden hose. If directly setting up Gyarados or Aegislash is possible, it isn't too bad, but especially if the optimal play requires elaborate switch or PP stalling, the battle time goes up significantly and the team has trouble hitting even like ten battles per hour. The most outrageous offender in this way is Crobat4, which I guess I can beat via a Head + Sneak KO with Aegislash—however, that's obviously not the greatest setup, and at some point I realised I could also switch-stall it out of all its attacking PP + Taunt and then have Gyarados set up on it. And so I did. If you're into watching a 77-turn battle that took about fifteen minutes real time, feel free to punch C9JG-WWWW-WW2U-LWMM into your VS recorder :3 Again, it can be tedious, but there's something really, really soothing about the complete and utter control that a diligent, long, and elaborate but foolproof setup exudes.
And I'm not in a rush anyways, am I? This time I did 1024 battles in about five to six weeks as opposed to like three times as many, which needless to say is a much, much more sane number u_u Marathon's lyrics also fit this streak pretty neatly (although a mere battle maison streak is slightly less important than life itself I guess); it's about individual goals, and this number was a huge one—that third 1k, a 2^10 streak for (as was the planning att) post 2^10. There's also a self-adminition saying that life is long enough... don't burn yourself out, but take some time to enjoy the road. This time, I most certainly did, and I don't think I'll lose this streak to burning out like I did in April.
To think I actually find the song only "good" at best, lol.
1000 posts also makes for a "marathon" in its own right—especially because I like to think most of them actually ended up contributing something to the site. I'm not that much into milestone posts and therefore wasn't really planning on doing anything initially, but since I obviously got a little more involved here than I initially envisioned, it would be a shame not to use the opportunity to look back at everything that's happened since June 11th, 2014. I didn't know anything to do other than write up a post in my secondary home on this site, which I just completed I guess, and when I thought up this team I thought it would be cool to "post a 2^10 win streak for my 2^10 post." It's more than a little amazing that I actually did it lol, although obviously in the end it turned out to be a 1k after all as opposed to a 2^10—the emotional value of hitting four digits ended up outweighing the hipster value of 2^10, not much else to it, and this gave me the chance to post it on my one-year GP anniversary. Sitting on this streak for even longer (I hit 1024 on October 2nd) was getting a tad tedious too I guess.
This road I enjoyed too—let me lead you along.
As with most people who end up at this site, I was first drawn to the strategydex. That must have been during the fourth gen—I mostly missed out on genIII (att) because I didn't have a GBA and Smogon didn't, like, exist when I played genII lol, but naturally, when you're getting back into the game, actually getting to know game mechanics this time, and trying out two generations of Battle Frontiers, it stands to reason to embark on a Google search to find the "best sets" for specific Pokemon, and obviously I ended up here. I was sorta intrigued by those sets, but because of a variety of reasons, a notable one of which was the scandalous neglect of signature moves, I don't think I actually ended up using them. Fast forward to the beginning of XY—I largely skipped the fifth gen apart from like a single playthrough of the games because they were really kinda bad—when I got the games because "eh it's Pokemon I guess" and a friend of mine, who was a tad more enthusiastic than I was to get back into the game, wanted the two of us to build a couple teams to battle each other. With the new breeding mechanics and that Ditto safari I happened to have, that actually sounded feasible—but naturally I needed sets, so I returned to that one place where one could find those. In a sense, I was very, very lucky that there was no working Smogdex att, because this time I actually discovered the forums. First, it was obviously only the analysis workshop, but as I slowly discovered other sections, there also turned out to be a thread on the Battle Maison, which I was struggling with att but felt I could beat (actually contemplated joining Serebii for that, but the guys here seemed to know a lot better what they were talking about). I lurked the forums for about six months before finally joining, even discovering forums like cong in advance, but there were only three reasons I had for signing up—apart from the Maison thread, there were a couple nitpicks on analyses I wanted to offer, and there was also the grammar dojo, which I felt like checking out at some point. I like thinking about language, and I was so impressed by a couple GP members—like, seeing how hory would perfectly patch up something that sounded like trash by switching like two words around would have me all like "i want to be able to do that too."
For what it's worth, my friend and I ended up battling only once before he once again lost interest in Pokemon until generation VII, and my skillful defensive core of Ferrothorn + Slowbro ended up crumbling his pancake stack of pseudo-legendaries :3
In my first couple months, I honestly wasn't sure how long I'd stick around. My pool of analysis nitpicks quickly ran dry (also because I realised I didn't really like battling against humans lol), I didn't know if I would have anything left to accomplish in the Maison after "five trophies + Starf Berry + one streak on the leaderboard," and I kinda assumed my grammar checking attempts would be in vain because being a foreigner naturally isn't much of an advantage when it comes to gauging if something "sounds" right.. A little over two months after joining, though, I woke up to eight wallposts from people congratulating me on a ladybug that came completely out of nowhere. Apparently I had been doing something right—there must have been something that spurred those eight guys into giving a random user such an incredibly pleasant surprise?
Anyways, as it turned out I was supposed to use that badge for making SCMS edits, and so I did. In the mean time, I also continued visiting the dojo and amchecking, and halfway through September I applied for the team. I was pretty sure I wouldn't make it; in all honesty, I only applied because I felt my checks were stagnating and felt that I didn't have anything to lose—worst case I would get rejected and receive feedback from the head honchos. There was also the foreigner thing; while I thought it wouldn't be an instant dealbreaker if a Swede was in charge of the whole thing, until the very last moment I thought I wouldn't be able to conquer that, uhm, handicap. I felt I wouldn't make a fool of myself for applying because people like Gato and frenzy generally would have only a couple changes after my checks, but when all was said and done I was applying with literally half a stamp lol, so that didn't really boost my confidence either. In practice, however, it actually ended up being 1,5 stamp, because C_P stamped the fresh Granbull check I submitted, and four weeks later, he got back to me with a message "welcome to the team." I was so, so proud that, in spite of my foreign-ness, I was apparently good enough to edit stuff for a pretty prominent website—it's been one year to the day, and that feeling is still as strong as ever.
It honestly became mostly quiet around me from then onwards. I was on the team, I kept up somewhat consistent activity for an extended period of time, but my check output honestly wasn't all that impressive because I was probably wasting too much time playing the games lol. I'm not the most social person either and am not one to go actively looking for friends, so I pretty much became a niche user who would grammar check an analysis every now and then and make the occasional ostentatious tl;dr post in this here thread, and I didn't think I'd branch out much further on this site. I didn't mind, either. Playing Battle Maison was fun, grammar checking was fun, cool new colleagues would show up every now and then, and the April / May drama didn't drive me away.
Then it slowly became summer, school was clearing up, the Maison was boring, and I wanted to GP stuff, so I GPed stuff—and I also talked to friends around here. Generally, though, I was still the same niche user as I ever was—but early July, P Squared and I both received a PM from Oglemi that essentially came down to us being given the chance to take the site staff test because it would just be easier to have us cache our own CMS edits. So, from one week to another, we evolved from regular GP contributors to freaking modless site staff lol—whereas site staff usually comes as a package deal with C&C mods, we (and earlier bolts, and later anto) earned that flame by itself and were apparently considered trustworthy enough to be entrusted with directly editing the site. Felt really good and brought back memories of those eight users congratulating that one random on that other pretty red badge.
At a moment like that, people obviously start discussing their hopes and dreams. Up until that point, though, p2 and I had kinda pictured we'd always have just the lone teardrop, and since we don't really do anything other than GP checking, there wasn't much else we could see ourselves achieve out here... well, except... becoming a GP leader of course. In the dim and distant future. Sweet dreams they were, obviously also with a friend of ours being a co-leader already—after we got the flame badge, p2 brought up that a team consisting of Gato and the two of us would be "pretty cool." Totally agreed, nice dim and distant dream haha. However, it took only a couple weeks for that dream to become one step closer to reality, when C_P stepped down and Oglemi cruelly tore apart our fire-and-water partnership to give the leads position to the candidate who deserved it way more than anyone else—and not that long after, Jocke stepped down too. No replacement was appointed right away. However, I heard through the grapevine who most people wanted to see there: me o__o
I mean, I guess it made sense, because I was the seniormost active checker after Gato and the most active one after p2 and had never really heard anything about people being dissatisfied with my quality, but damn...... Obviously I was at the right place at the right time because lol at the notion that I would have been picked if like Ender or frenzy had been active—but needless to say, August 22nd it happened. Like one hard-working Asian had succeeded the other a little under a month before, one foreign Zelda fan replaced the other as the third GP leader. With downright overwhelming support lol guys, I still don't get where all those likes came from, but I've stopped wondering about it :] I'll be around, I like this place, and it would seem this place appreciates me too.
That's pretty much the short and long of it, honestly—if y'all found my Smogon story boring, that's most likely because it pretty much is, lol. I'm one to... I don't like change for the sake of change, so if I'm comfortable where I am, I'm likely to just stick around because why wouldn't I. So I guess me not really branching out over the rest of the site can be considered a compliment to the folks from the Maison and C&C—guess it's time to round out this wall of text by thanking a couple folks who've made my time here worthwhile. If I forgot you, my sincerest apologies ;n; lmk and I'll add you.
P Squared
As much as I didn't expect to actually get involved here, I really didn't expect to make any friends here... much less one who could rival even my (amazing) irl friends. Thanks for being there with that one thing when I needed it, thanks for being a cool GP colleague before, and thanks for being an absolutely amazing friend ever since ;u; It's an absolute joy talking to you, and I can always count on you to just understand me, and you know just how much that means. You're pretty much the last person one needs to tell that friendship is beautiful. And to think our GP leader dream team has actually become reality—that's what really makes the position worthwhile.
Twins :)
cant say
It's so hard not to get along with you dude—you're always helpful and friendly, no matter what section of the site you hang out in haha. Glad to see you and your metagame get the recognition you deserve, and glad that we can work together in C&C too haha. You're also the kind of guy who prefers a 100-win streak with a double Destiny Bond team over a 1000-win streak with Aegislash. We need more guys like you in this thread.
turskain
Astounding Maison player who is very very generous with his knowledge and expertise. If you hadn't put those out there for me to leech off, I don't think I would have joined you in the triple 1k club haha :) Also a really cool guy in general and a passionate poster, both in this thread and in the IRC channel.
GatoDelFuego
No more fiery avatar, but always a fiery guy, and quite possibly my greatest supporter when I was about to be made a co-leader @__@ those words honestly couldn't possibly not have been sincere. And with a passionate guy full of integrity like you at the helm, the GP team is gonna be fine :) a long and prosperous leadership to the three of us.
Berry Juice
Come back to life buddy, you still need to post your new run with Toge and Kanga :0
VaporeonIce
Quite possibly the friendliest user in this thread, and most of all someone who really understands why we're all here sharing our more successful and our less successful endeavours and theorymon with each other :) oh, and a pretty decent battler and teambuilder too I guess ^^
NoCheeseJumpman16ReptoAbysmalGG UnitatsyncEppie
Thanks to the rest of Battle Maison crew for being the amazing guys you are :) whether you're a friendly and helpful topic leader, brilliant mad scientists whose every word is worth reading and have the guts to speak up when it's needed, or just really cool people—you guys are the reason I keep coming back to this thread even when I don't have anything to say myself.
Calm PokemasterEnderhoryzhnz
Thanks for being cool and for teaching me your ways when I was still a lowly amchecker :o it would seem you guys did an alright job.... I would never have gotten as far as I did without your help (maybe not even onto the team), and for that I can never thank you enough :>
Also thanks to hory for being the GP member who originally inspired me to start amchecking, and especially to C_P for, y'know, adding me to the team... and for seeing potential in me that I wouldn't have dreamed of seeing, although I'm not sure if you ever expected me to get this far :p
Oglemi
Thanks for the trust and appreciation boss, really means a lot.
Great team, and even better 1000th post, The Dutch Plumberjack! I'm big fan of all you bring to both our Maison community and the GP team over at C&C. I remember when we were both quite recently badged and I would post some analysis grammar corrections or the like in the SCMS queue for site staff to approve, and how often there would be a whole bunch of your similar work in the queue in front of me! And of course, the Battle Maison article either never gets finished or ends up a far lesser work without your stepping in. You mention the "really cool people" who keep you coming back, and I hear you on that. From my perspective, you're absolutely one of them!!
In other news, I've updated the leaderboard through here, so as always, please let me know if you spot any errors or omissions. And don't worry, Dragonite, Mega Slowbro, and Chansey are coming!
So... I've kept using the Sand Team I posted not long ago. My idea was to stay with the team members setup I posted until I lost and then try the changes recommended. So far I've managed to hang on the Maison. The streak is currently at 135 battles, not really impressive considering the records here, but hey it's actually the first run in triples I've gotten this time around and I think it's quite good. I'm seeing if I can reach the 200 battles.
EDIT: Well I said Intimitade users were a rather big problem for this team. Well here's a rather extreme case of it: 92GG-WWWW-WW2V-7SAP
I did make changes in the moves though, here it is:
The lead of the group. She sets the first Sandstorm obviously and the Smooth Rock is pretty self explanatory. After a Tailwind she's actually faster than even some Scarfed enemies. Rock Slide is a stab and flinch inducing move, given how unreliable Stone Edge can be and hits pretty hard thanks to the STAB. The flinching is also pretty useful and I have gotten some good ones when paired with other Rock Slides or Iron Heads (especially good against veterans who love bringing legendary birds and genies). Crunch is a more power hitting stab move and it can dispatch the Lati Twins (which can be very dangerous to the next team member) easily, really if it gets a Super Effective hit it will knock out said opponent, save some very defensive ones. Low Kick is for coverage against Rock, Steel and also Normal and to a lesser extent Dark Pokemon. Enemies like Blissey, Regigigas and Slacking can be a pain if not dealt with quickly especially since the former two love spamming status effects. Protect has two porpuses, guard against the next team member's Earthquake and predicable Fighting type moves, given she is a magnet for those. To be fair it's not hard to see when the opponent's will try to go for one of her weaknesses, so it gains some valuable time for the team.
Haumea (Mega Garchomp) (F) @ Garchompite
Ability: Sand Force
IVs: 31 / 31 / 31 / x / 31 / 31
EVs: 6 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- Earthquake
- Iron Head
- Rock Slide
- Protect
The star of the group. Her Earthquake is an absolute Nuke. I was tempted to go for an Adamant nature to get maximum power, but it has happened to me that her maxed speed is needed for the turn when I set up Tailwind or can't do it for another reason. That little extra speed has saved me several times. Earthquake is self explanatory, 170 Base ATK + 252 EV + STAB + Sand Force hits hard, unless it's a defensive pokemon whoever is hit with go to the floor. At first I was between Iron Head or Dragon Claw, but decided Iron Head because Dragons aren't that common and they have another weakness that can be exploited by the rest of the team (Crunch takes out the Lati Twins, the most dangerous ones, Rock Slide dents heavily Dragonite, Salamence and Noivern and Low Kick helps with Hydreigon). Iron Head allows to target Rock, Fairy and Ice Types for more damage than Rock Slide (or Dragon Claw) and more reliably as well, good thing give Haumea's weakness to the latter two. Rock Slide works similarly than it does for Tyranitar, given the high ATK of Mega Garchomp and Sand Force it can hit hard. A funny thing is that given Mega Garchomp's high natural bulk it can trade blows with defensive pokemon just fine, it has tanked Ice Beams and Moonblasts. So if the enemy has a defensive build it will survive Haumea's attakcs but won't be able to KO her back (most of the time anyway). Protect is there because Garchomp is attracks Ice, Fairy and Dragon Moves a lot. If an Ice Type or a Dragon Type is on the field they will go for Garchomp. Protects allows to make them waste a turn and the team members to get free hits in.
Tailwind is the key here, it makes the entire team of slow heavy hitters faster than almost anything, even some scarfed enemies. The idea is to get Tailwind out turn 1 taking advantage of priority, however there are times when I have to go on the offensive to keep advantage or if the enemies are too slow. Brave Bird is a blessing in triples; it has priority, it hits very hard with Sharp Beak and can hit anyone on the field. It can take out fast threats easily such ass most Fighting or Grass types that may be an issue for Tyranitar and also heavily dent other pokemon to allow my other attackers to take them out. Flare Blitz is an excellent move due to its coverage and high power, it helps with Ice Types threatening Garchomp and the Bug/Steel combos (and Ferrothorn) that resist my Rock and Ground moves which appear quite a bit. Protect is for Rock attacks that will chase down Talonflame or easy to see Electric Attacks, same way as the previous two team members. I used U-Turn for a while but rarely ever found myself using it, I mean, Talonflame usually goes down pretty quickly, be it from exposing herself in the turn where Tailwind was used or wear down thanks to the recoil moves. Also, more than once it got hit with an enemy prority attack and went down. So yeah, I am just switching now.
Second Sandstorm user, but also a sturdy as hell defensive pokemon. Really in the whole run of 135 battles it has been KOd once and it was by a critical hit from a Vaporeon Surf. Granted he comes out at the very end when my other team members have dealt with mostly everything (by the time Sandstorm runs out the battles are almost over) and only the really sturdy enemy pokemon are left. Still, many times Tobías is the last guy standing and won by simply refusing to die while wearing down the enemies (notable cases are a Donphan who haxed 5 Hydro Pumps and Iron Heads and a Dragonite). At first I was gonna follow the advice of using a Hippopotas LV1 as bait... but after Hippowdon displayed how well a defensive pokemon complements the team I decided to leave him in.
The naturally good bulk and Physical Defense investment allows it to tank physical hits like a champ. My own Garchomp's Earthquake takes a bit less than a third of his HP so I can use it if I need to. He can also take Special hits well from Pokemon without offensive builds. This is important, offensive Pokemon go down to my front line, it's the defensive ones the ones that last until the end and those lack attack power. Redundant, yeah, but I am saying is that Hippowdon faces those and can handle them quite well.
The idea is to go for coverage against things my team can't hit well. Dragons that may threaten Garchomp or Gliscor or other ground types for that matter, are good examples. Ice Fang is to wear down that problematic bunch, especially given that they also avoid Earthquake. Earthquake is a good STAB move and can hit SE a lot of things. However a good choice is to use Toxic and buy time. Hippodown thanks to Leftovers and Slack Off can last a lot and Poison does its work well. I did have Superpower for a bit, however Hippodown due to a defensive EV spread doesn't hit hard enough to OHKO with it and weakening its own defense kills his own fighting style. I did try Yawn for a bit, but I found it unreliable. More often than not the enemy woke up 1 turn later.
Elun (Excadrill) (F) @ Life Orb
Ability: Sand Rush
IVs: 31 / 31 / 31 / x / 31 / 31
EVs: 6 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Drill Run
- Iron Head
- Rock Slide
- Aerial Ace
The secondary speed attacker. I know that max Spe EV + Sand Rush + Tailwind may seem as overkill, but it happens quite a bit that Tailwind wears out by the time Elun comes out. When that happens Sand Rush still allows her to outspeed everything, important given that unlike my other team members she's pretty fragile. Also, thanks to the Life Orb she can hit as hard as Mega Garchomp (or at least that's what it seems... still she hits hard). Everything else is pretty straightforward.
I chose Drill Run over Earthquake to be able to use an Ground move freely without risking of killing my own teammates, especially since in later stages I don't have protect spam or Rotom or Talonflame to use safe earthquakes. Granted it doesn't hit as hard, but it's still a good choice. Iron Head is a secondary stab, mostly for neutral hits against things that resist Drill Run or super effective against Rock types or the eeeevil Ice and fairy Types that may threaten or have taken out Garchomp. Rock Slide works on the same principle as it does for MegaChomp and Tyranitar.
Now Aerial Ace seems like a nonsensical choice, but I have it for two main reasons: 1) It hits anywhere on the field, so it allows Excadrill to wear down things far away. It has happened that Elune is on one of the sides and I need to hit something on the other side to help get it killed (usually with only Elune and Hippowdon left against 1 pokemon on the other side). 2) Double Team spammers have become increasingly more common as I advance and hax makes them untouchable. They are usually defensive pokemon so it takes a bit to take it out, but also it means they can't dish out much damage in return. Also hitting Grass, Fighting and Bug types reliably is great.
Echo (Rotom-W) (?) @ Assault Vest
Ability: Levitate
IVs: 31 / x / 31 / 31 / 31 / 31
EVs: 252 HP / 252 SpA / 6 SpD
Modest Nature
- Thunderbolt
- Discharge
- Hydro Pump
- Dark Pulse
The final team member. The spread... I guess I have to fix it maybe boosting defenses with 100 Def / 252 SpA / 156 SpD or something.
Still, Levitate makes it immune to my own Chomp's Earthquakes so it makes a good switch in. Assault Vest makes it very sturdy against special attackers that may threaten my first line such as water or ice types. Discharge is a great choice given most of my team is immune to it and two who aren't can Protect. Thunderbolt is when I need a bit more power and can't affort to use Discharge either because I need that turn and can't waste it on Protect or simply one of my enemies resist or is immune to Discharge so I need to hit the other harder. Hydro Pump is a powerful STAB for Rock and Ground types, especially useful against study phisically defensive foes. Dark Pulse is not only for coverage but also to hit anywhere on the field in the same way as Aerial Ace on Excadrill.
The ideal pattern is to get Tailwind with Talonflame and take advantage of my teams great attack power and good defenses. Rotating between my Sand casters if necessary is not a big problem, given they are both rather sturdy, especially Hippowdon. At first Ice types were a nightmare given they could take out Garchomp in one hit, but Protect almost completely solved that given Ice attacks became very predictable in the long run.
I actually sticked to having Garchomp in the middle instead of putting it at a side with Talonflame at the center because it allows to hit Garchomp anyone on the field, great thing with her massive power (Earthquake hitting all my enemies decides the battle many times) and also because thanks of how it attracts Ice, Dragon and Fairy moves it can be a good bait with protect to buy time. Also, that way Talonflame gets a safer spot to make it after using Tailwind and takes advantage of Brave Bird hitting anywhere on the field.
The biggest threats at first were intimidate users, but while they do hinder the team they don't stop it on its tracks as I feared. Common users such as Gyarados, Luxray, Arcanine, Salamence and Staraptor all are still weak to move types I carry and can be taken out rather quickly, given I can adjust things with switching later on. Ice types go down easily as well, but you have to make sure that you will KO them, otherwise it can get ugly. Talonflame or the Sandstorm itself helps with that.
Also, unlike my previous attempts at the maison this team doesn't have a... what we call "Bestia Negra" as in a particular foe that screws over the entire group. Rather enemy combinations can be complicated, such as several ice types or intimidate users or things immune to earthquake. But nothing really that can't be handled. I've gotten a fair share of close calls, but they were mostly to poor decisions on my part rather than hax or unbeatable foes. As in more than once I've KOd my own Tyranitar before realizing it or not used Tailwind when I should have. Well, Trick Room can be a nightmare... but I've come across it a couple of times and made it out. In those cases Hippowdon takes the spotlight again by being so phenomenally slow as it is sturdy... Good thing is that you can guess who's carrying Trick Room, when that happens you have to murder the suspect swiftly (so far Bronzong, Reuniclus and Cresselia, though the last one was in a team of speedsters... dunno what was going on there.) One last thing to be wary of is Wide Guard. It can make me waste entire turns and that can be pretty bad. Fortunately the users are rather limited and you can guess when it's coming, meaning you can guess when to attack single targets.
I played this streak several months ago - a while after the Aerodactyl/Metagross/Metagross/Aerodactyl streak. I was planning to do more attempts at AI Multis and try to break 200 wins, but then ninjachicken1 posted an absurdly long 257-win streak, which raised the bar that much higher. 200 wins (160 after Battle 40) seemed like a difficult, but not unreachable goal if the RNG were very favorable, given I already made it to 177 and 139... but beating 257 (218 after Battle 40) would require a lot more luck and time investment than I was in for, if it was even possible for the team. As such, I gave up playing Multis and settled for this as my record, though I'm not satisfied with it since it fell short of #1 at the time and didn't make the 200 goal.
As for the team itself, you'll notice that it's identical to the one The Dutch Plumberjack posted just recently (aside a negligible EV difference on Greninja), with which he achieved a 73-win streak. I'd read his five-trophy post (and Liked it) prior to making this team, but I'd forgotten about the Multis team and theorymon'd Greninja/Gardevoir independently through the following process:
1) Greninja as the lead. What other choice is there in AI Multis? Metagross needs support, and Greninja was used in the highest streaks so far. A very easy decision.
2) For the back-up, the restrictions of Multi Battles change usual Doubles teambuilding principles a little. Because the AI is unable to switch out its Pokémon and you only have access to a single switch option, the value of having switch options is much lesser since you can't double switch, help your AI partner in any way, or have more than one switch option unlike when considering switches in Super Doubles. As such, more than switch options, you're looking for revenge killing potential and 1-Pokémon sweeps in the back-up; for this, I settled on Mega Gardevoir which could potentially win 1v2 in some cases thanks to Hyper Voice hitting both targets, while also having 100% Hyper Voice as a powerful nuke in 1v1 situations (without the MT 75% reduction) that would pop up relatively often in Multis with the AI partner's shakiness and Multis mechanics where KOing both two Pokémon of either AI trainer would result in the AI only having a single Pokémon in the field for the rest of the battle. Thanks to its special bulk, it could beat just about any special attacker 1v1, while having the Hyper Voice nuke for a shot against physical threats, especially if Aerodactyl can help.
Mega Gardevoir worked out nicely - it wasn't much of a switch option for Greninja, so I often kept Greninja in against faster foes, saccing it for one or two moves. When I did switch it in, it was into special attackers whose attacks Gardevoir could tank with its base 115 Special Defense, or resisted attacks such as Fighting-type attacks on lead Greninja, or Psychic-type hits on Fighting-type Greninja.
I had better luck with this team than TDP did - I think I made it past the Chatelaines on the first streak, and picked up the 139-win and 177-win streaks on the first few attempts. I don't recall the exact details since it's been a while.
I don't think Steven is that bad of a partner; he's a lot stronger than most options in XY, including the Skarmory/Golem one I used there. Aerodactyl isn't good, but STAB Rock Slide is a good move to bet on when it chooses to use it with okay chip damage to set up KOs for allies and the flinch chance. It's too bad the AI goes for the much less effective elemental Fangs quite often.
#178 - VQ8G-WWWW-WW2T-GHFA vs. Chandelure/Slowking/Gengar/Tyranitar
The loss. Ace Trainer Jai and Hex Maniac Mara team up for a bad colossally bad match-up.
T1: Dark Pulse Chandelure, Chandelure CHs Metagross for the OHKO while Slowking sets up Trick Room
T2: Greninja KO'd by Water Pulse + Heat Wave, Aero KOs Chandelure with Rock Slide - AI sent out Gengar
T3: Slowking KOs Aerodactyl, Gengar survives Psyshock with Payapa Berry
T4: Gardevoir KO'd, I lose
There wasn't much to be done, with a TR setter I couldn't stop and a Chandelure that will be slower than Metagross after Mega Evolution, I had to go on the attack. With the Heat Wave CH, Metagross isn't able to use Zenbutt on Chandelure; without the CH, Metagross might've survived for a little longer and taken out Gengar, after which Gardevoir would've had a chance to win.
Psyshock on Payapa Gengar (Gengar3) also had a 50% chance to OHKO, despite the Psychic-resist berry.
#140 - LM4G-WWWW-WW2T-GHHC vs. Entei/Jolteon/Cresselia/Flareon
A loss from an earlier attempt that made it to 139 wins. The AI led with Scarf Entei and Jolteon, which outsped and OHKO'd both Metagross and Greninja on Turn 1. Aerodactyl then lost the Speed tie with Jolteon, and was also KO'd before it could take a move. Mega Gardevoir had trouble winning the battle 1v4 with zero moves from its teammates.
This is a fun battle that demonstrates the elevated variance that fighting two AI trainers in a Multi battle results in, on top of all the other factors going against the player's favor in this mode. The AI does follow Species Clause between trainers (even though it wouldn't have to, and the player doesn't have to), but I'm not sure if it follows Item Clause similarly or not... either way, the killer combinations it can bring out are much wider than anything you can encounter in Super Doubles.
I tried out Wally a few days ago, inspired by The Dutch Plumberjack somehow winning 145 battles in a row using him.
I first used Mega Salamence (Jolly nature with Return, Intimidate support for Mega Gallade which has 65/95/115 Defenses and could take a hit on either side with Intimidate to augment its weaker side) as the lead and Greninja as the back-up. This got me 49 wins as I lost to the Chatelaines, who led with Defiant Thundurus that OHKO'd Mega Gallade, then CH'd Mega Salamence with +1 Wild Charge. Salamence still survived, but that put it into KO range for the Cobalion last mon, which walled my Greninja while Wally's Magnezone did nothing as Nita's second Pokémon was Scarf Landorus, finishing it off with Earth Power.
On my second attempt, I put Greninja into the lead slot and kept Mega Salamence in the back. This time, I made it to 51 wins - losing nearly instantly after making it past the Chatelaines, and ending my attempts with Wally at an average streak length of 50. Greninja as the lead worked better than leading with Salamence, and Mat Block to support Wally's Mega Gallade and get it up to Mega Speed was effective. A calc:
252+ Atk Mega Gallade Close Combat vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Regigigas: 124-147 (57.1 - 67.7%)
252 Atk Aerilate Mega Salamence Return vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Regigigas: 114-135 (52.5 - 62.2%)
Fire-type Regigigas. I like doing neutral calcs against Regigigas to eyeball calcs and compare different mons since it's equally bulky on both sides of the spectrum, and a relevant threat for nearly every team in Doubles and Triples.
Wally's Gallade is stronger, faster, and more reliable at grabbing KOs than Steven's Metagross. Its bulk and typing is a lot worse, especially after using Close Combat - it's hard to say which one is better, but Mega Gallade is definitely an usable AI partner, more so than it seems at first glance. It didn't use Swords Dance too often with Close Combat giving it many OHKOs, and with Mat Block support and alright defenses it didn't always backfire.
The bigger difference between Steven and Wally is in the back-ups; neither Aerodactyl or Magnezone are stellar, but Magnezone is so much more horrible. Not only is Thunder woefully inaccurate, it tends to waste turns using Reflect and Thunder Wave while having the wrong ability and horrid EV choices. Aerodactyl at least has STAB Rock Slide to prove its worth as a hax machine and Focus Sash for reliability along with its high speed, but Magnezone does nothing at all in most battles. If Thunder hits through 70% accuracy, it might beat a target that can't hit it super-effectively - at 80 Speed, it's slower than most of the Maison and will lose to a large number of foes outright, and to many more if it misses with Thunder.
In Magnezone's defense, if it can OHKO a foe with Thunder (which is respectably strong if it hits) or Flash Cannon, it does usually go on the offensive instead of spamming Reflect. But if there are no super-effective or weakened targets, you can expect it to set up Reflect or use Thunder Wave on one AI Pokémon while getting KO'd by the other - or both instead of dealing any damage, if it manages to survive long enough for that. At least it has Air Balloon to avoid being OHKO'd right away with a Ground-type attack and allow allies to use Earthquake in some cases (which was useful with Mega Salamence), but it plain sucks in most battles. It also doesn't have any useful bait qualities, unlike Aerodactyl.
The Dutch Plumberjack, excellent work in Singles. It's unbelievable that Mega Gyarados beats Dragonite and Greninja (both as a lead and a back-up) on the leaderboards right now. I had no faith in it when you mentioned the team, but you managed to make it work spectacularly.
